Supreme Commander: Mass Effect
by Guardian54
Summary: I haven't seen any lol!OP!Humanity fics around that go as far into crack as this, so here it is. In 3865, 18 years after the Seraphim War, The Coalition of Species meets the Turians. Turian War is Ch 2 onwards Ch 1 Technical Details . Also includes Mass Effect 1 Events. Comes after my SupCom ME and KS Prequel and before SupCom: Koprulu Sector.
1. The Road To War

A/N: Prequel portion (originally the first 8 chapters) moved to Supreme Commander Fanfiction Archive. To find out about events that occurred before this portion of the timeline, please see chapters 1 and 2 of the other fic.

* * *

Chapter 1: The Road To War

10, August, 3847—Ruins of an ancient, advanced civilization discovered on Rakhana, the Drell Homeworld. Cybran and Drell archaeologists and scientists investigate.

15 August, 3847—Coalition of Species formally established, the UEF, Cybran Nation, Aeon Illuminate, Seraphim Republic and United Nations of Drell form the organization.

25 November, 3848—Once excavations, cataloguing, and analysis of the ruins is complete, Element Zero Technology released. The Drell embrace it, for although it is inferior to larger scale quantum manipulation tech, employed by the other four factions, it is still superior to the tech the Drell had before, and it has a slight advantage in small-scale, independently operating objects (no Nodes, administrative structures, or command units required)

15 March, 3849—Templar Fran, lover of Elite Commander Hannah Shepard, is killed in action on Altair II, taking five Order Commanders with him. On the same day, Hannah, supervising a new Element Zero processing facility, is caught in an Element Zero containment breach incident.

12 August, 3849—John and James Shepard are born.

3852—With the advice of the Republic, the Coalition leaders decide to investigate the use of space-based warships once more, in the event that other sentient species in the galaxy prove hostile and be inaccessible to gating by commanders. This is especially critical in light of the discovery of the Mass Relays, though travel times from relays are on average just over thirty minutes (Earth to Charon Relay), the Quantum Ion Storms that have plagued Coalition space since the Seraphim War make it difficult for a commander to gate in and establish planetary defences fast enough on border planets (Core Worlds of each faction are surrounded by hundreds if not thousands of orbital battle stations, in addition to having commanders on-station at all times, usually two or three per planet is enough, along with several heavily shielded Nodes and Control Centers.)

3859—The first non-prototype space-based warships are commissioned by the Coalition. The Seraphim contributed shields, Quantum Impulse engines, and Ultra-chromatic beam generators (Essentially Uttaushala point defence guns). The Cybrans contributed the basic frame design, Proton cannons, Loa Tactical Missiles, Heavy Microwave Lasers and Zapper TMDs. The Aeon contributed Will-O-the-Wisp TMDs, various classes of Oblivion Cannons, Quantum cannons, Zealot Space Interception Missiles (a souped-up version of the Anti-Air Missile by the same name), Phason Lasers, Paragon Resource Generator (for the carriers) and Sonance Artillery. The UEF contributed the Ravager Point Defence Gun, Dual Ionized Plasma Beam Cannon, Triple Gauss Cannon, Mavor Mass Accelerator, and Plasma Accelerator.

5 September, 3865—The first of the Coalition Battlecruisers begin to be planned out, all Coalition ships are crewed by a small crew of no more than 50 people, controlling the systems, Cybrans dominate the crews, as their direct interface ability gives input speeds several times faster than any UEF, Aeon, or Seraphim citizen.

8 September, 3865—Present Day

* * *

COALITION SHIPS AND UNITS LISTINGS

I may or may not eventually get a Deviant Art account and post CAD images of the ships (blueprint format)

All build times are counted as IN-SPACEDOCK at a rate of 360/second, in other words, for a T3 engineer to try to build one in the field would take 24 times as long. All ships up to Light Cruiser including Escort Carriers can land on any planet. Heavy Cruisers only on low-gravity planets, Battlecruisers cannot land effectively. Battleships will not be introduced until later in the story. WARNING: Anchorage Clamps can be used to transport land or air units. Clamps are positioned 10 meters apart. T3 units take up 4, T2 2 and T1 1. Aircraft anchorage numbers may vary (T3 typically take up 3 rows, T2 typically 2, T1 1, if columns of clamps are close together, an aircraft may take up the spaces for both columns.)

One ME dreadnought slug does 8000/hit to shields, 16000 to Structural Fields (against ground-based structural fields, 8000 as well)

* * *

Corvette (appears like a brick with 2 wings near rear, hence the width)

150 x 100 x 30 Dimensions, 3m Armour

No internal ACU bay

5 minutes build

8,000 Shield points, 15000 Structural Integrity (aka HP)

"Light" weapons:

3 Zealot SIM Launchers

1 Dual Proton Cannon (same as Salem/Siren-class ships)

2 Dual Quantum Cannons

3 Zapper TMDs

2 rows of 8 clamps on bottom hull.

* * *

Frigate

300 x 60 x 50 Dimensions, 3m Armour

1 SCU carryable internally

15 minute build time

20,000 shields, 25000 HP

"Light" weapons

2 Ravager Point Defence Guns (built into nose)

2 Loa Tactical Missile Racks (each 2x3=6 missiles, total 12)

1 Dual Proton Cannon

1 Light Oblivion Cannon (same as on Exodus-class T2 Destroyers and Oblivion T2 PDs)

2 Dual Quantum Cannons

6 Zealot SIM Launchers

4 Zapper TMDs

2x8 clamp rows up front, 2x6 in rear (of ACU bay)

* * *

Destroyer

400 x 80 x 50 Dimensions, 5m Armour

1 ACU Carryable

40 min build time

60,000 shields, 50,000 HP

This is the best among medium vessels in anti-capital firepower, and is the mainstay of Hunter Groups.

"Medium" Weapons

2 Dual Plasma Beam

2 Heavy Proton Cannons (dual guns, not like the clusters of 3 on Galaxy-class T3 battleships)

3 Medium Oblivion Cannons (Same as on Omen-class T3 Battleships)

2 Ravagers (just under the nose, fixed mounts)

4 Zealot SIM Launchers

4 Zapper TMDs

2x16 clamp rows up front, 2x8 in rear (relative to ACU bay)

* * *

Light Cruiser

400 x 100 x 60, 4m Armour

1 ACU Carryable

30 min build

40,000 shield, 40,000 HP

Provides Aerospace Staging and local anti-fighter firepower in Hunter Groups (as well as TMD support against surface targets)

"Medium" Weapons

3 Light Oblivion Cannons

1 Dual Proton Cannon

2 Ravagers (actually turreted, surprise!)

4 Loa Tactical Missile Racks (6 each)

10 Zealot SIM Launchers

8 Space Flak Batteries

5 Will-O-The-Wisp TMDs

6 Zapper TMDs

2 x 24 clamp rows

* * *

Heavy Cruiser

500 x 120 x 150 Dimensions, 5m Armour

2 ACUs carryable, 1 Onboard Quantum Gate

120 Minute Build Time

55,000 Shields, 40,000 HP

Air/Space Staging, Provides Artillery Support to Hunter Groups

"Heavy" Weapons

1 Sonance Artillery Gun (Same as on T3 Emissary Heavy Artillery Installation, comparable strength to Mavor round but slower round and rate of fire, therefore less effective)

1 Triple Gauss Cannon (Same as Summit-class T3 Battleship, very powerful but take a long time to reload)

2 Dual Plasma Beam Cannon

4 Light Oblivion Cannon

2 Loa Tactical Missile Racks (3x4=12 format)

2 Ravager Point Defence (Turreted)

11 Zealot SIM Launchers

9 Space Flak Batteries

7 Will-O-The-Wisp TMDs

8 Zapper TMDs

2 x 24 clamp rows on bottom hull. 24 clamps/side for aircraft if needed.

* * *

Escort Carrier

550 x 200 x 300 Dimensions, 5m Armour

Does not carry ACUs, internal build rate = 250 (A Restorer takes 19.2 seconds, a Gemini 12 at this rate)

180 minutes build time, mini-Paragon onboard

50,000 Shield, 20,000 HP

Each Rack of craft is 5 long, 1 tall. The ship carries 2 stacks of such racks. Each stack holds 8 Aircraft. Racks cycle when launching, The ones on top discharge their aircraft from the Launch doors, then fold into the ceiling, the next one moves up and discharges, then folds, then the next, then the fourth and final. Space/Aircraft spew from both sides' slits (Launch bays) at the same time. Thus it launches in waves of 10 to 40 (depending on Tier of units). Landing is the reverse procedure, fly in, anchor, rack drops into floor, next racks filled, drops, next racks, etc.

Carries up to 40 T3, 80 T2 or 160 T1 Aircraft, when in battle, it will usually rapidly fabricate more aircraft than it could ever hope to carry to overwhelm the enemy Aerospace defences. Aircraft can, like land units, anchor to the anchorage points every ship has on its hull. Carriers usually have an absurd number of such anchor points.

"Light" weapons

2 Light Oblivion Cannons

1 Dual Proton Cannon

2 Ravagers

8 Zealot SIM Launchers

8 Space Flak Batteries

10 Will-O-The-Wisp TMDs

8 Zapper TMDs

Quantum Jammer Onboard

4x30 clamps on bottom hull. 2x30 along each side (side clamps are always aircraft-exclusive)

All transport clamps include light engineering suites (T3 Engineer-level) to slowly repair/refuel the units anchored there. However, bear in mind that Air Staging Suites are much faster for air units and that resource generation of ships, even at high output, is very low indeed, only one mass (two tons) per second and a hundred energy points for Corvettes, Frigates fare little better. Destroyers and Light Cruisers, however, have higher energy OR mass generation (toggle to meet demand) to fuel their activities. Heavy Cruisers can manage the large amounts of energy required to Gate an ACU onto a planet from the edge of a planetary system, a distance of several light-hours, or alternatively keep a Sonance Artillery firing at its maximum rate of one shot per twenty seconds in addition to manoeuvring. Escort Carriers use their onboard mini-Paragons to power a Quantum Jammer able to cover several thousand kilometres in every direction, allow their incredible build rates of Air Units, and sometimes to take temporary control of a small ground-side army via the Network Node onboard, able to support up to 200 units. Escort Carriers have a crew of 10 people.

* * *

A/N: Other, heavier ships will come out as they are developed (I have plans, just need to finish up the layouts for efficient descriptions of battle sequences…). Right now, John and his brother James are 16…

Supreme Commander Tech has been moving ahead incrementally, the interests of most of the young researchers and many of the older ones drawn to Mass Effect Tech instead, even though it is less powerful. Suffice it to say that though everything's gotten better since 3847, the balance is still more or less the same, though ACUs are now tougher, and the Mavor mistake (it does 12000 damage, not 10000 per shell!) will be corrected.

Remember, Structural Integrity Field Tech and Weapons Tech both rising at comparable rates means no net relative change…

* * *

Unit Roster:

UEF—United Earth Federation

CN—Cybran Nation

AI—Aeon Illuminate

SR—Seraphim Republic

Hovering units are amphibious and cannot be hit by torpedoes when over water.

Coalition standard, for Aeon, Cybran, UEF, and Seraphim Commanders alike, the Drell are more or less a client state at this time. Each commander can modify their roster to suit their own tastes, and many add a few non-standard (and usually more like Tech 3.8, considering Armoured Assault Bots are said to be Tech 3.5) experimentals or units to suit their style of war.

The Command Interface now has two rows for unit choices, primary choices and secondary choices. They each have their pluses and minuses but the Secondary is generally less flexible and/or powerful than the Primary. Tertiary choices are displayed next to tehe primaries in the same box (each unit type has a "box" in the control panel which it is displayed in)

* * *

Tech 1 Land:

T1 Engineer: Cybran (using Aeon hover tech, wheels faster on land) or submersible UEF

Scout: Spirit (AI, hovers) or Selen Combat Scout (SR, Stealth and Cloak when not moving, has a weapon between that of a LAB and Scout)

Light Assault Bot: Mech Marine (UEF) or Hunter (CN)

Light Armour: Mantis (CN) or Striker (UEF)

Light Mobile Artillery: Zthuee (SR) or Medusa (CN)

Light AA: Sky Slammer (CN) or Thistle (AI)

T2 Land:

T2 Engineer: UEF Combat Engineer or Cybran T2 (with hover)

Medium Armour: Rhino (CN, now 3 gun barrels) or Obsidian (AI)

Amphibious Tank: Riptide (UEF) or Wagner (CN)

Mobile Missile Launcher: Viper (CN) or Flapjack (UEF)

AA Flak: Banger (CN) or Ascendant (AI)

Support: Asylum (AI) or Deceiver (CN)

Assault Bot: Mongoose (UEF) or Ilshavoh (SR)

T3 Land:

T3 Engineer: Cybran T3 Combat Engineer (fitted with a Two-barrel Rhino tank Turret), Aeon Engineer

Heavy armour: Othuum (SR) or Harbinger (AI)

Siege Assault Bot: Loyalist (CN) or Titan (UEF)

Armoured Assault Bot: Brick (CN) or Percival (UEF, though more powerful than the Brick, it is very vulnerable to lower-tech swarms, unlike the Brick)

Sniper Bot: Usha-ah (SR) only

Mobile Heavy Artillery: Serenity (AI) and Spearhead (UEF, launches 3 Tactical Missiles in each volley to overwhelm TMDs)

Support: Athanah (SR, Heavy Mobile Shield)

* * *

Naval Units:

T1 Frigate: Trident (CN) or Thunderhead (UEF)

T1 Attack Sub: Silver (Cybran) or Tigershark (UEF)

T1 Attack Boat: Shard (AI, specialized AA boat)

T2 Sub Hunter: Uashavoh (SR Destroyer, submersible) or Barracuda (CN, has personal stealth)

T2 Destroyer: Salem (CN) or Exodus (AI)

T2 Cruiser: Siren (CN) or Ithalua (SR) or Exodus (AI)

T2 Support: CI-18 Mermaid (CN, Stealth field emitter) or Bulwark (UEF Shield Boat)

T3 Tactical Missile Ship: Plan B (CN Strategic Missile Sub, has powerful torpedoes and Tactical Missiles in addition to Strategic Missiles) or Torrent (AI Missile Ship, fires 10 missiles per volley, now uses Loa Tactical Missile Racks instead of Serpentine Tactical Missiles from before)

T3 Battlecruiser: Galaxy (CN, was a Battleship in the Infinite War but is now cheaper and since it's got torpedoes therefore classes as a BC, not BB) or Neptune (UEF)

T3 Battleship: Summit (UEF), Hauthuum (SR)

T3 Carrier: Keefer (AI), Command (CN)

* * *

Air Units:

T1 Scout: Flying eyes (CN) or Hummingbird (UEF)

T1 Interceptor: Prowler (CN) or Conservator (AI)

T1 Attack Bomber: Zeus (CN) or Scorcher (UEF)

T1 Transport: Vish (SR) or Courier (UEF)

T2 Fighter/Bomber: Janus (UEF) or Corsair (CN)

T2 Torpedo Bomber: Cormorant (CN) or Stork (UEF)

T2 Gunship: Renegade (CN) or Stinger (UEF)

T2 Transport: Vishala (SR) or Star Lifter (UEF)

T2 Other: Swift Wind (AI, Combat Fighter, better than Fighter/Bombers, not as good as ASFs) or Mercy (AI, T2 Guided Missile, it's like the Fire Beetle but much faster)

T3 Spy Plane: Spook (CN) or Blackbird (UEF)

T3 Air-Superiority Fighter: Gemini (CN) or Wasp (UEF)

T3 Strategic Bomber: Revenant (CN) or Ambassador (UEF)

T3 Gunship: Broadsword (UEF) or Restorer (AI)

* * *

Experimentals: (Divided into following categories, like how buildings are divided in FA into factories, economy, direct fire, indirect fire, and Intel in the construction bar)

Land Assault: Monkeylord (CN) or Galactic Colossus (AI) or Ythotha (SR)

Support: Fatboy (UEF) or Megalith (CN)

Air: Soul Ripper (CN) or CZAR (AI)

Sea: Atlantis (UEF) or Tempest (AI)

Strike Aircraft: Ahwassa (SR) or Novax (UEF, a hovering satellite far above the battlefield, very poor against shielded targets)

Super Artillery: Scathis (CN) or Salvation (AI)

Endgame Artillery: Yolona Oss (SR) or Mavor (UEF)

Resources: Paragon (AI)

This is just some background info on how the Supreme Commander Tech line has adjusted after the union of all the factions.

Structure-wise, commanders are allowed to pick and choose what they themselves prefer. Most lean toward the same combinations as the Elite Four used near the end of the Seraphim War, as the combination has proven its worth time and time again.

* * *

A/N: The Relay 282 Incident is soon to come, just had to lay out the ships and units that will most likely be seen in the Great Turian Shoot (forget Turian Turkey Shoot, it's Tu-something either way…)

Something I gotta say, the ships in the Space Wars mod for FA seem absurdly weak.

Also, shields are in bubble form for all ships unless otherwise stated (how else would the transported units be protected?)


	2. The Gathering Storm

A/N: Though the ME Wiki says Councillor Valern, this author is of the opinion that Velarn sounds better… Also, I decided the Salarian Councillor's name would be Councillor Armin.

Also, a nod to left hand turn signal's Mass Effect: The Reclaimers fic with the two dreadnought names, _Void Hunter_ and _Dawn Under Heaven_. I have nothing but the utmost respect for him; at least, I think he's a him…

* * *

Chapter 2: The Gathering Storm

_Eighteen Years before Present—15, August, 3847_

"I have a feeling, a feeling that this" Rhiza gestured at the Coalition treaty that officially formed the Coalition of Species "is not peace… This is an armistice for twenty years. In that time, another great war will come, not among us, but against something else, an intruder…" she said, he warrior's instinct guiding her. It had rarely failed her before, so Princess Rhianne agreed with her Avatar of War, Doctor Brackman thought it plausible, President Macune of the Drell agreed with the prediction, considering the ruins recently found on Rakhana. President Hall of the UEF and the new Prime Minister of the Seraphim Republic, Ratheen, took a bit of persuading, but they soon agreed that with the new technology found and evidence of even more life existing in the galaxy, it was perfectly plausible that in less than twenty years, another Contact War would come.

* * *

_Present Day—8 September, 3865 _

Councillor Velarn was somewhat irritated, sitting in one of the seats of his private shuttle, and was currently contemplating whether the other two Councillors were having an affair without telling him. He discarded the idea after a moment of contemplation; Asari and Salarian couples were rare and usually not very productive, since any children would not even be early adolescents before the Salarian parent died. Thus, to save their children the pain of never really knowing their father, most Asari did not bother entering relationships with Salarians. Nowadays, Turians could live about 200 hundred Galactic Standard Years, which incidentally for some odd reason matches up with the orbital periods of Thessia and Palaven, the Asari and Turian homeworlds. He shook his head at the ridiculous thoughts flying across his mind; the boredom must have really been getting to him…

"Councillor, we are on final approach to the _Void Hunter_, please prepare for docking." His pilot said over the speakers in his quarters.

"Understood." He strapped his safety harness back on as the frigate-sized shuttle reached the dreadnought and docked to the much larger ship. "Pilot, you may return to the Citadel once I board the _Void Hunter_ and inform you it is safe to do so from its bridge."

"Acknowledged, Councillor."

* * *

"Our objective is to investigate claims of unknown alien activity being sighted on the Galactic southern borders of Citadel space, in an area of space where rightly no Mass Relays should have been activated yet." The Councillor stated, in a meeting with the various captains in the fleet he was now in overall command of. One other dreadnought, the _Dawn Under Heaven_, was in the fleet, along with thirty-four cruisers and sixty-four frigates, the cruiser and dreadnought captains were present in the conference room, while the frigate captains received holographic footage and could pose questions in similar fashion. "The fleet will divide into two elements, Admiral Valern will be in command of the _Dawn Under Heaven_, its seventeen attached cruisers and thirty-two frigates, and he will answer directly to me. I will remain aboard the Void Hunter and lead this half of the fleet. Once we locate suspicious alien activity, we will call in the other fleet and together confront the aliens. Do NOT open fire unless fired upon!" He paused, looking into the eyes of the officers one by one "I cannot stress this enough, if they do not attack us directly, you are not to under any circumstances launch an attack, understood?" The captains and admiral acknowledged the command as one.

"I must ask, Councillor, what if we find evidence of hostilities between the group we are looking for and another alien group, or evidence that they have attacked Citadel ships in the recent past?" Admiral Valern asked.

Councillor Velarn's first thought was _Why did Tevos and Armin have to stick me with the one brother-in-law I absolutely could not tolerate?_ His second thought was _I wonder how many typos my sister made when she tried to take his name after they got married, good thing she never went through with that part of their marriage…_ "Admiral, in those cases you will sit back and observe, if you see them actively attacking Citadel vessels, you will move to apprehend them, as is your duty, as part of the peacekeeping fleet, keep barriers up and all that, but do not open fire unless they strike first. If you see them fighting other aliens, retreat to a safe distance, call and transmit sensor readings to the Void Hunter, and we will decide whether or not we should contact one or both groups. Is that clear?" He said in a voice that brooked no argument.

"Perfectly, sir." The Admiral backed down; partly because he had a feeling he would be sleeping on the floor when he got home if he pissed off his wife's older brother enough.

"Alright, we'll do a standard search pattern of the systems, the dreadnoughts and most of the cruisers sitting near the relays while the frigates fan out and deploy sensor drones. The main fleet elements will jump in if support is needed by the frigates." Councillor Velarn continued the tediousness that was a briefing.

* * *

"Well, admiral, seems like we're all together again, the old crew…" Seth-Thauum said casually, sipping at a bottle of Coke "So, do we still hold the position being of the Elite Four? I've been kind of busy trying to incorporate Quarnon Cannons and Ultrachromatic Beam Generators into Coalition designs, so I haven't been too up-to-speed on the rankings."

"Yep, and of course HQ's asking us of all people to take their newest toys out for a spin, Ostensibly, we're supposed to take turns staying in fleet command if it comes to us gating down for combat." Williams said, patting one of the bulkheads of the Heavy Cruiser fondly. The ship was equipped with 5m external armour, plenty of space for the weapons, nanolathing gear, and supporting engineering suites. Then there was another 2m armour belt containing the crew habitation zone, complete with escape pods, power core and shielding.

"Well, that makes a lot of sense. We're all very good at basically everything, but Hackett's best at economy and macro-managing. I specialize in assault strategies, Williams in defence and Seth is essentially an on-call guy able to handle any role fairly well, without specializing, he's also the best at using mixed-faction armies" Shepard said.

"By the way, how are John and James doing at Biotics training?" Hackett asked.

"Oh, they're doing fine, making friends and all that. They made friends with this Aeon guy named Kaidan Alenko, decent boy, last I met him. According to my sons it's really funny trying to get Rahna, a UEF-born girl, to hook up with Kaidan, they keep on denying it…" She shook her head sadly "Young people, as always, are completely unaware of their own mortality…"

"Hey guys, I was just wondering, can we have a simulator tournament sometime just for old times' sake? The four of us against eight AI opponents on a plateau defence-type scenario, how about it?" Seth said, trying to break the tension that hovered in the room.

"Sure, if we win, we're stepping it up to twelve, sixteen and then twenty AI opponents." Shepard said. "But we're doing this from our own ships, in case something real comes up and bites our asses."

And so, the four went back to their own Heavy Cruisers, Turning over command of each Hunter Squad in the Hunter Clutch, as it was called, to their captains before engaging in the ACU simulators. Each Hunter Squad included One Heavy Cruiser, two Light Cruisers, and three Destroyers. The Clutch also included Frigate Squadrons (4 Groups, 6 Frigates and 10 Corvettes each) and an Escort Carrier.

According to doctrine, the Frigates and Corvettes would not be manned unless conducting planetary evacuation or aid missions. The Destroyers each had a ten-person crew, and so did the Light Cruisers, Heavy Cruisers featured fifteen crew each. Each Hunter Squad in this mission had a Frigate Squadron slaved to it, and each could draw on Aerospace support from the Escort Carrier, which was crewed by 10 men and women.

Their mission was to escort a new Quantum Gate Constructor (the new designation for Deep Space Explorers) into unknown space via a newly discovered Mass Relay, to expand the Quantum Gate Network, reconstructed after the war. Instead of Orbital Gates, it was now in the form of massively fortified groundside Gate Complexes, designed to patch through the quantum link through to other gates anywhere on-planet as well as to the next, or the next five, systems in any direction. A few Orbital Gates remained in-place on the most travelled routes to delegate the quantum flows, but they were far less common than they were during the Infinite War. Instantly gating to any planet in the Human Quadrant was now far more difficult, with more gate checks, than before, so the Insurrectionists were greatly hindered (an understatement) while normal traffic went by as usual.

The reason they required such a large fleet for the task? The Explorers were only lightly armed, and reports of sightings of unidentified ships had caused security to be tightened greatly along the border of the quadrant. Evacuation drills, abandoned since the end of the Seraphim War, were conducted again among the more remote worlds. Patrol fleets had been stepped up, and the more significant worlds in the Coalition Rim, as it was designated, garrisoned. There weren't enough commanders to assign one to each world, so most used command bunkers and/or Network Nodes instead. The new Bunkers and Nodes were a giant step up from the old ones, not only were they stealthed, they were also cloaked and had their own Omni Sensor Array, supported by internal power generation. Oh, and let's not mention the shields, onboard weapons, and mostly underground nature.

"We have contacts emerging from the Relay, they are moving into a search pattern of the system we're headed toward." The Sensor Officer on Hackett's Heavy Cruiser stated, as the souped-up Quantum Optics systems of each ship focused in on the target area, as detected by Quantum-enhanced Radar and Omni Sensors, unhampered by atmospheric interference, could see up to a light-year with sufficient power put into them. If anything, every Coalition Warship was over-powered, so it was with ease that they spotted the predatory-looking ships emerging from the signature distortions of Mass Effect FTL.

One of the ships, most likely the flagship, was just over a kilometre in length, utterly dwarfing the Coalition Heavy Cruisers and the Escort Carrier, at 500 and 550 meters long respectively. "They're powering up shields." The man reported, though Hackett with his Command Interface already knew. The crew on coalition ships was basically a backup, after all…

"Launch all fighters and Gunships, have them hold position here, here, here and here" he holographically designated four points on his holographic interface, between each two of the four Hunter Squads. The Constructor, a 1000 meter long colony-founding ship, was ordered to move back behind the cover of the Escort Carrier's powerful shields, which though it was a smaller ship provided enough cover. Thus the fleet formed a formation with the Carrier and Constructor in the middle rear, the four Heavy Cruisers in between them and the enemy, on the 45 degrees points to the ecliptic relative to the Carrier (think the 5 face of a dice), the Frigate Squadrons holding position between the Hunter Squads, while the Fighter Squadrons held position just outside the square formed by the Cruisers, said Cruisers directly between them and their Carrier. The Carrier began fabricating more aircraft immediately, focusing on Geminis and Restorers, though Revenants were also assembled. Of course, these were the newest generations of their designs…

Hackett was suddenly thankful he came out of Quantum FTL far away from the system and advanced with caution. Even now, technicians aboard the Constructor were latching their ship onto the relay and beginning to repair and restore the artefact to full functionality. Though Mass Effect Tech was inferior to Quantum tech, the Drell still used it, as well as the other Coalition species on the occasions when a Quantum Storm blocked transit along a major route.

* * *

"It seems we've found them." Admiral Valern said, his mandibles flexing into a Turian and distinctly predatory smile. "And they don't really look that advanced either; see the clunky designs of their ships and the absence of heavy mass accelerators? If we attack, we could probably wipe them out, that big one looks more like a colony ship than anything else too…" He commented to Spectre Nihlus Kryik, who was stationed on the _Dawn Under Heaven_ for this mission, just in case something went bad with the Contact.

"Sir, the Mass Relay is visibly changing." A sensor tech said.

"Onscreen." Valern commanded, frowning. He watched with growing horror as the Primary Mass Relay's (oddly considering their resilience) dented, greyish exterior began to smooth over, a glowing red web of lines encasing the relay. "They're changing the Relay… order our wings to close in and form screens, charge up the mass accelerator, we cannot allow them to reprogram or otherwise tamper with that Relay without repercussions!"

* * *

"Sir, they've powered weapons and are advancing, the big ship in the back of the formation is orienting its axis toward the Carrier, likely using a spinal gun."

"Do NOT fire, unless they shoot at us…" All four commanders, now Rear Admirals, said at once, and, as it was eighteen years ago, Hackett still held operation command, mostly.

A glowing yellow dot travelled outward from the biggest red icon at a rate of 4000-some kilometres per hour "Fire all weapons at the enemy Frigates and Corvettes, tell the Constructor to get all the workers back and jump to Quantum Space, tell the Carrier to get out of the way if their shields drop below 40%. When the Constructor leaves, the Carrier can start evading regardless, got it?" Hackett ordered.

The first dreadnought slug slammed into the shields of the Carrier with the strength of 38 kilotons TNT equivalent of directed force. This dealt 6000 damage to the 50,000 strength of the Carrier's shields (in the Seraphim War Era, it would have been 7500 or so points), not much by any account. The Paragon was replenishing the shields at a rate of 500 per second when the second slug slammed into the shields, the ship just sat there, protecting the Constructor behind it. Though every two seconds the enemy fired at the range of 40,000 kilometres, it didn't do much.

The four heavy cruisers opened up on the enemy Frigate-sized ships while the Frigates and Corvettes closed with the enemy Corvettes. Four Sonance Artillery slugs spun up, nanolathed into swirling vortices of condensed quantum resonance plasma, antimatter, and containment cores. They had their masses increased one million fold relative to themselves but not at all relative to the rest of the universe, and then sped down the barrels at a speed of three kilometres per second. They instantly accelerated to three thousand kilometres per second once they left the barrels; their kinetic energies concentrated in so much smaller a mass than before…

The first Sonance round, bearing the equivalent of 12,000 shield points' worth of damage or seventy-five kilotons of energy, speared right through the alien formation, eviscerating a pair of corvettes that got in the way, before finally detonating against the hull of a frigate and blowing it to bits of scrap metal. The gun would require thirty seconds before it could fire again, regrettably, considering the relatively low power output of Heavy Cruisers compared to a groundside base.

The other three slugs had similar results, tearing apart several enemy corvettes and destroying or severely damaging enemy frigates. The enemy artillery vessel remained unharmed, even as the Cruisers laid down a swarm of Loa Tactical Missiles from their racks, supplemented by the Frigate groups, which were bearing down on the enemy right behind the missiles. This was followed by the charging of the secondary artillery weapons of the cruisers, the Triple Gauss Cannons, and the charging of Dual Plasma Beam Cannons by the Destroyers and Heavy Cruisers. They let loose upon the remaining elements of the hostile fleet even as the behemoth moved, reorienting itself toward one of the Heavy Cruisers

* * *

"Admiral, in their opening salvo we have lost 6 Frigates, 4 Cruisers, with one cruiser disabled." The Sensor officer reported. "We have hundreds of missiles bearing down on us; interception grids are hot and ready."

"By the Gods, the estimated yield for their artillery weapons is twice that of a dreadnought slug!" The Weapons officer cried, looking at the readouts.

"What? Impossible! Directed Energy Weapons!" Another sensor officer yelled in alarm as brilliant blue beams connected ships on both sides. Hardened Turian armour and hull boiling and melting before the onslaught of plasma. Another sixteen Frigates went up as their shields were overwhelmed and their hulls burned away, A Cruiser did the same a moment later when it was struck by four salvoes of Gauss Cannon fire in staggered blasts. The first six shell impacts sheared away the shields, the seventh shattered the remaining kinetic barriers (Note: kinetic barriers are effective against all sorts of weapons, after all, light has kinetic energy, and so does EVERYTHING else) and the last five each detonated against the hull with a force of three kilotons per slug. The ship shattered in under half a second.

"They are still closing distance, probably to use closer-range weapons." The first sensor officer said with a note of panic in his voice.

"Fleet full astern, all ships throw everything you've got other than interception grids at the enemy, focus on this target" He highlighted one of the enemy artillery ships in his holographic map of the battlefield.

"Enemy missiles entering range of interception grids, lighting 'em up now" the Weapons officer said as the Guardian laser interception suites opened fire on the swarm of incoming missiles.

* * *

"Ah, the wonders of Loa Tactical Missiles…" Shepard said even as she manoeuvred her Heavy Cruiser to "daintily", if such a term could be applied to a starship weighing hundreds of thousands of tons, sidestep the incoming mass accelerator slugs. At 20,000 kilometres and closing in range, the enemy frigates had about a one in ten chance of hitting with her erratic movements, the enemy corvettes even lower, the only reliable hitting force was the behemoth, which hit once per three shots. She watched with typical Cybran pride as the interception grids on the opposing ships opened up and Loa Tactical Missiles were met by lasers not unlike the Zappers her own ships used in abundance. The aliens did NOT seem to expect the missiles to split in four after being hit though, so each missile still did what would be to her 2000 damage points. If they had not been forced to disassemble, they would have done 6000, or a directed three kiloton payload with nanites and overload pulses disabling the structural field and/or shield overcharge that would normally reduce the damage significantly. Now, the individual fractions did 300 tons TNT worth of damage each, only 300 tons worth. A total of 576 missiles had been put into space by the Coalition fleet. The enemy ships managed to shoot 566, which left a total of seven hundred and nine point two kilotons' worth of energy headed toward the alien fleet that randomly attacked them for no apparent reason.

* * *

"The missiles split when hit! Brace for imp—" The line from the forward cruiser and frigate screens abruptly went dead as thousands of explosions littered space and Turian ships brewed up one by one until only the Void Hunter and a handful of ships, protected by its mighty kinetic barriers, remained.

"Energy build-up detected, in enemy artillery ships and all other cruiser and heavy cruiser-sized ships." The weapons officer said. "Our slugs are simply not hitting them often enough, recommend we call in the rest of the fleet, or… fight another day."

"Are you joking? The Dawn Under Heaven's shields can take a lot of punishment, even from their heaviest guns, I say we close to knife-fighting distance for higher hit rates" the Admiral said "If it comes to it, the opening of our FTL drives might cause some damage too!"

"Aye sir." The helmsman said, while the communications officer patched it through, with a gentle thrum in its decks, the Dawn Under Heaven's huge engines lit up and the ship began accelerating toward the enemy fleet, manoeuvring thrusters keeping the main gun solidly aligned with one particular enemy Artillery Ship, which also turned, still accelerating in the same direction it was before, and discharged its own slug at the dreadnought, while the dreadnought fired back. The slugs crossed in space without colliding, the mass accelerator round slamming into the Heavy Cruiser's shields while the Sonance round smashed into the Dreadnought's shields, causing the kinetic barriers to pulse overcharge and be taken down five percent. The other three Sonance shells reduced the Dawn Under Heaven's shields to 80% capacity.

* * *

"So, they have pulse overcharge on their heaviest ship shields too…" Shepard mused while her "Shield Low" alarm began bleeping. She switched on her cloaking device and accelerated, moving out of the way of the next slugs and pulling alongside the enemy ship. She patched through a quantum communication channel to the other three commanders, well, technically Rear Admirals, but still… "Guys, I estimate that behemoth's shield strength around 240,000 points, order all squadrons to close in and open up with all available weapons on it. Manoeuvre freely within squadron designated space."

Engines all across the Coalition Fleet were pushed from their former leisurely twenty percent maximum thrust to full thrust, and within moments the Dawn Under Heaven found itself assailed by a swarm of gnats—Gemini-class Aerospace Superiority Fighters and Restorer AA Gunships, along with a fleet of Frigates and Corvettes. The sluggish ship's escorts were stuck in a similar predicament, more specifically the same predicament, as the behemoth. Oblivion Cannons, Medium and Light, opened up across the Coalition Fleet while Ravagers began their non-stop rattling, pouring fire down upon the enemy.

* * *

"Shit." Was the Admiral's comment as the shields dropped to 25% after yet another barrage of those weird glowing Artillery slugs "Order the fleet to begin spinning up FTL drives, we're getting out of here, scan for a nearby habitable planet where we can hopefully land and make repairs, and get me a line to the Hierarchy." The officers did as instructed

* * *

"Mass Effect FTL detected charging in hostile fleet." Hackett's sensor officer reported. "Our Carrier and Constructor are evading their trajectory now."

* * *

_Citadel Station, 9 September, 3865_

"We discovered another intelligent race apparently tampering with an unknown Primary Relay, Relay 282. They appeared to have repaired the slightly damaged artefact completely and thus most likely have changed its programming. Admiral Valern chose to aggressively confront the enemy by opening fire on the ship docked to the Relay. The visually primitive ships fought back with never-before-seen energy and kinetic weapons and, using their far superior manoeuvrability and apparently powerful shields managed to destroy the whole of the Dawn Under Heaven's attached fleet except three Cruisers and two Frigates. Thirty frigates and fourteen cruisers were lost in the engagement; we have detected a probable colony near the system we are currently in, will recon next galactic day" a set of coordinates came through "Requesting Hierarchy fleet support and recommend that the Turian Hierarchy but not the Citadel Council go to war with these aliens, who are obviously a major threat to the Mass Relay Network and thus a threat to the existence of the Council." Councillor Velarn listened to Nihlus Kryik's report while fighting off the urge to slam his head repeatedly into his desk in the Council Chambers, where the Councillors were meeting to discuss this new development.

"This is troubling news indeed." Said Councillor Tevos, steepling her fingers and frowning "The aliens' modification of the Relays seems to resemble the Rachni modification of the Relays, encasing them in some sort of material that we later had to use fusion torches to burn away to make the relays useable again."

"The Turian Hierarchy confronting the intruders seems a good idea. If things go sour, the Council can attempt to mediate a peace or throw in support for the Hierarchy. If things go well, well, nothing more needs be said." Councillor Armin said

* * *

_Shanxi, Coalition Rim World, 9 September, 3865_

The Shanxi colony was a small agricultural colony founded only two months ago, a calm, tranquil, Earth-like planet, excellent for farming, without local sapient life, or indeed any form of life until it had been terraformed and its orbit adjusted. That had been a little over a year ago, the same tranquility was about to be shattered…

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE PRIMARY SPACE ELEVATOR'S NOT GOING TO BE FINISHED UNTIL TOMORROW?" This was Grand Crusader Williams' first comment on leave, with only her ACU accompanying her, to manage and safeguard the colony. The impending Quantum Storm would render effective quantum travel all but impossible in the area for several days if not a week or two. The colony already had two Paragons set up in two well-fortified bases north and east of the main colony, taking advantage of the V-like shape of the elevated ground the colony's sole city was on. Taking note of Cybran and UEF designs, all the buildings were well-reinforced, many featuring Surface-to-air missile batteries or Flak batteries along ledge areas on the buildings (there were no outdoor patios halfway up buildings, the defences occupied the space). Numerous Athanuhthe Heavy Shields covered the city, mounted on the rooftops of the larger buildings, and eight Guardian-class SMDs were also present, Two per quadrant of the settlement.

The Paragon Bases each included three T3 Land Factories, four T3 Air Factories, two SMDs, and were also covered by Athanuhthe shields. One normal resource base was in the crook of the V-shaped ridge. It had 6 T3 Mass Extractors, all turned off due to the Paragons' presence (it was a back-up base after all) and 10 T3 Power Generators to supplement the 8 already in the city and powering its shields.

One Mavor per Paragon base formed the core of the defences, having been upgraded enough to launch a small (400-kg) slug at 4000 km/s if need be, using normal slugs, it could fire a 4000-ton slug at up to 50 km/s. The alternate fire mode packed less total energy, but that was due to the power drain of the mass-increasing quantum fields needed to give the slug enough acceleration time, considering the barrel was only 400 meters long.

The space elevator was a massive spire that was being constructed from the center of the settlement, pointing up and to be connected to a space station with space dock. Much to William's irritation, said space station was not yet operational, oh, the Space Elevator and all its Control Nodes and defence batteries were online, but the stupid Space Station would still take the 100 T3 Engineers another thirty minutes to nanolathed. She could field up to 3000 units and structures at the moment, and so she added some more defences and corrected weaknesses the civilian colony planners had made. Nanolathing more of the kilometres-tall buildings the colonists would live in was a tedious task for the Grand Crusader. This particular colony was one of the mixed-faction colonies that had started to appear fifteen years after the war, when most of the work of rebuilding was done and scars had begun to fade. She would keep it safe, after all, if there was an attack, the colony had nowhere to run…

She listened to the news idly, hearing about yet another lost set of colonists being discovered in the far Galactic East, along with two alien species. One was humanoid, aiding the non-corrupt Terran faction, the so-called Raynor's Raiders, the aliens called themselves the Protoss, claiming to have been helped in their evolution by an ancient race called the Xel'Naga. The other was an insectoid race called the Zerg, apparently with the ability to infest humans. The factions in the area, the Koprulu Sector, were fighting to destroy the Zerg, overthrow the oppressive Terran Dominion… blah, blah, blah… she yawned. _Why, oh why did I have to be reassigned on the first day of my period? I'm irritable then, or did Avatar of War Rhiza forget, or did she just want me to scare to crap out of the civvies administrator?_

* * *

Tens of thousands of light-years away, a certain Avatar of War, situated on Seraphim II, Capital World of the Aeon Illuminate, was busy dabbing at her nose, wondering if she'd caught cold. Then a grin spread across her face as she remembered reassigning Grand Crusader Williams to Shanxi for some R&R, the sneeze was probably from Williams being grumpy about it. Then she called up Williams' file, because there was nothing much to do at the moment and she didn't feel like using the simulators, and her eyes widened. _The local administrators are SO screwed…_ Williams was and still is legendary for her PMS-ing, thankfully she ran on a 45-day cycle, but this week, would have been THE week.

Moments later, uncontrollable laughter echoes in the quarters of the Avatar of War. The guards and personnel outside all looked around at each other, shrugged, and went back to their work. They saw nothing, they heard nothing, that was what they agreed on, though they still chose to tread carefully around the Avatar of War until they were sure she hadn't gone mad with boredom.

* * *

_10 September, 3865_

"Fleet synchronized and all FTL drives charged. We are jumping… now." The Navigation Officer announced aboard the Dawn Under Heaven, secondary flagship of the newly assembled Turian Assault Fleet. It was agreed that the general strategy would be to land an army on the surface of the planet, then hold geosynchronous orbit over the landing area to provide orbital support. If the worst-case scenario occurred, the fleet would provide a volley of orbital bombardment, then hold distance out of range of surface to orbital weapons or orbital defence platforms and let the army disable control centers and communications hub so as to cut fleet losses.

A lush green world came into view, one large city visible on its night side surface, a glowing line of lights stretching above the city. "Space Elevator detected, along with a large space dock, complete with defences. Fleet moving to other side of planet now, we will land over the horizon from this primary city and then fight a ground campaign toward it. The _Dawn Under Heaven_ will provide a shield for the other fleet elements from enemy orbital defence fire."

By the time the fleet got over the horizon from the enemy, even charging and going to FTL to do it, the Dreadnought's shields had dropped to 20%.

* * *

Shanxi Capital City, 10 September, 3865

"Oh shit, the Quantum Storm's already started, so I can't gate there… and those towns on the other side of the planet were never fortified. I guess I'll have to do it via the Control Nodes in the one Primary City on the other side of the planet…" Williams muttered to herself, as the red contacts moved to land troops near the other side of the planet, on the second part of this largest continent. Mavors were too slow to be effective at over-the-horizon work (there's a speed limit in that case) against the enemy spaceships, so she was left with very little in terms of options. Astoundingly, there weren't even any Engineers in the area, so she actually had to send a pair of Continental-class transports, each with 6 T3 Engineers (all of the Cybran Combat design, each featuring a two-cannon turret from an older-version Rhino Medium Tank) along with 2 Ascendants, over to the other half of the super-continent. The trip would take the transports 10 hours, considering the massive hurricane they would have to weather slowing them down slightly. She ordered the outlying towns to evacuate into the central city, which was well-fortified and could hold out. She would feed the Alien fleet a Yolona Oss missile if it came down to it, to get rid of the enemy's orbital support. In her own base, she started construction of several dozen Frigates and Corvettes to drive the enemy out with, Geminis and Restorers would not cut it, the enemy frigates' weapons could kill them with relative ease, and so could the secondary guns of the dreadnoughts, or so the Coalition Space Command designated them.

Things were going to go nasty fairly quickly for the aliens, because though in space the Coalition was reasonably adept at warfare, on the ground they were absolutely lethal. (A/N Nod to Dawn of the Third Age: V2 by Tscorpio1701 in this sentence)

* * *

A/N: I do own Hearts of Iron 3, hence the chapter titles and starting quote (though this quote is my favourite, the one from the Road To war starting point of the game, and it's the only one I'll use). However Cahpter Titles up to Ch 14 (the whole of the Turian War) will amtch Hearts of Iron 3 Start Points.

You could probably smell Spacer Shepard from a thousand miles away as soon as this fic started, well, you were right. Anyways, note that transport clamps for ground units have yet to be included in ship designs. The clamps are currently exclusively for extra aircraft produced by a carrier while in combat (once 75% of the possible clamps in a fleet are taken up, the supporting carrier will cease production of units until some are destroyed).

Expect Nihlus to live, and before you rail on me about how idiotic Valern and/or the Council is, remember that the last time an unknown Primary Relay was opened in Citadel Space, the Rachni Wars occurred, which indirectly led to the Krogan Rebellions. Valern is currently acting psychopath because not only are they accessing an unknown Primary Relay, they are MODIFYING IT! THE HORROR! *end super dramatic voice*

BTW: The tactical decision to close in: Citadel races focus more on range in weapons, so they aren't expecting such power in the shorter-range weapons. They expected anti-fighter guns, they got Oblivion Cannons and Ravager Plasma Chainguns... yeah.

Expect the next chapters to be titled the following:

Chapter 10: Blitzkrieg—Turians attack outer towns and meet no resistance, taking over the territory without response in the first few hours of the invasion.

Chapter 11: Barbarossa—Turians start attacking Primary City of that continent. It's called biting off far more than you can chew, with the city's garrison of defensive units and engineering stations (The Hive-class, Cybran design) for repairs. Though Williams can only field 500 units at a time, not 3000 unit cap like her own side… yeah. The Continentals reach the city…

Chapter 12: Day Of Infamy—Orbital Bombardment begins of Secondary Cities, no loss of life on Coalition side except the few people caught outside the shields/shelters, but first experimental weapon fired in Turian War—The Yolona Oss.

Chapter 13: The Tide Turns—Turians evicted…forcibly. A PMS-ing Grand Crusader is not to be taken lightly.

Chapter 14: Götterdämmerung—Conclusion of the First Contact War…

I'm excited, are you? Review please (anyone who wants to complain about my use of HP and Shield Points please see Chapter 6 for explanation)!


	3. Blitzkrieg

TO CLEAR SOMETHING UP:

The previous chapter did in fact hold a massive Starcraft Reference. The best aspect of Supreme Commander is that it is large enough to hold many, Many, MANY things within it, as well as being small enough (in terms of area of Galaxy taken up) to have things outside it.

There may or may not, ahem, be a planet that has several major continents named Kanto, Johto, Sinnoh, etc. within Coalition space. Why do you think the FA map "Shards" says "_The Aeon believed that this planet was blessed with The Way, and for generations they protected it from the presence of sentient life._" in its description? Or there may or may not be a moon named Pandora around on of the Gas Giants in some obscure Coalition system.

Also, there may or may not be "Lost Colonies", which may or may not sometimes involve temporal anomalies, which feature the following histories (Other than Starcraft, obviously): Avatar: The Last Airbender, Gears of War, Firefly, etc.

Contact with the Covenant form Halo will be in a different fanfic, a different time stream, so don't ask me about it until I finish this and the accompanying Supreme Commander: The Koprulu Sector piece. Star Wars would also be _delicious_ for a Crossover…

Thank you for you patience.

* * *

Chapter 3: Blitzkrieg

_In orbit around Shanxi, 10 September, 3865_

Nihlus was having a minor disagreement with Admiral Valern. The Admiral thought that judging by the presence of the Space Elevator, a technology the Citadel council did not currently possess, this was no doubt a major colony. Who would bother putting up such as massive and likely massively expensive structure on an average colony? It must be a core world of this alien government's piece of the galaxy.

Nihlus was of the opinion that if these aliens had such advanced technologies, the space elevator did not mean shit. It could be that this alien government was advanced enough to afford one for every colony, and the planet most certainly did not look like a core colony in his eyes, maybe an agricultural world or mining world, but certainly not a major population center. He also expected the invasion to go sour very quickly, which was why he would be going along with the ground force, so that if need be, he could countermand the Admiral's likely idiotic orders and lead his troops to survive.

"Greetings, Admiral, Hi, Nihlus!" Saren Arterius said as he entered the conference room, just as the Admiral was leaving. "So, Nihlus, you gotta wonder, why'd they have to send both of us? Isn't one Spectre enough?"

"I don't know, Saren, but I do have a really bad feeling about this…" Nihlus shook his head and scratched his fringe nervously "If the ground troops are anything like the oversized gunships and mini-frigates we had to face earlier, it's gonna be pretty damn nasty down there." (A/N that's Geminis and Restorers)

"I'd say so, according to the footage of the battle I watched. I hope our military, especially doctrine, is still up to par, it has been a while since the Hierarchy fought a major war… By the way, still got your old eyepiece?" And so the conversation went from there, even discussing how the Drell on Kahje, the Hanar homeworld, suffered from Kepral's Syndrome far too often and how it was simply wrong to keep a species adapted to arid conditions on a world that was 90% covered by water and that the Hanar should have relocated the Drell to a more arid planet within Hanar territory as soon as possible, and there were some planets far too arid for Hanar but fine for the Drell…

* * *

A/N: Yes, I changed it, the Hanar did come to Rakhana a number of years before the Cybran Nation did, and they rescued some of the Drell, imagine the culture shock when they learn that they can go Home again…

* * *

"We're coming in for a landing." The pilot of the massive troopship declared over internal speakers. "Prepare to disembark, this is a levo-world, so check your air filters, you don't want to die from pollen inhalation!" The thousands of Turian soldiers sat stoically within their Armoured Personnel Carriers and Landcruisers (always thought that was a more descriptive but inferior term than tank) in the many decks of the troopship. The enormous doors opened on the nose of the craft, and the armoured vehicles began to roll out onto the grassy plains of Shanxi. Once there was enough space, the massive elevators at the back of the bays began to lift down vehicles from the decks above.

The same scene was repeated hundreds of times, thousands of tanks and armoured personnel carriers spilling onto the plains as well as tens of thousands of Turian infantry. The many-pronged assault forces split up as they surged away from their landing zones, which were being fortified by the later waves of troop ships, and branched out toward the local settlements, which all featured defensive walls.

"They still use WALLS to defend themselves? How primitive!" Saren commented, his mandibles opening wide in surprise as he stood, his upper half exposed through one of the many hatched on the APC.

"Don't underestimate the enemy, Saren, you were always the headstrong, confident one… even back when we were in basic training." Nihlus commented from the next APC over.

"You were always the cautious one, Nihlus, that's not a bad thing, but remember, speed almost always wins." (A/N: Age of Empires 3 reference, the cheat for rapid gathering/building)

The armoured column met absolutely no resistance as it closed in upon the settlement cautiously, leapfrogging from one patch of forest to the next. Air Support had yet to be landed, so they had little recon information besides satellites. Finally, growing impatient, Saren ordered one of the Landcruisers to fire on the village's walls. There was no response, and so Nihlus ordered some of the infantry to disembark and move closer to the village through the tall grass, which appeared to be a form of grain. Nihlus himself went with the infantry force.

* * *

"All clear" an infantrymale said, taking the first cautious steps into the Settlement. He blinked in surprise, nothing blew up under him, and nothing seemed out of place in the little compound. It was comprised of 2 tall, blocky skyscrapers and a surrounding wall. One… thing, a stack of three spherical objects on a round pedestal, perhaps a shrine of some sort, sat on one side of the settlement. Another structure, triangular and much taller, split into 3 distinct spires, sat near it. The structures seemed to be completely powered off, the power seemingly simply cut. He moved forward cautiously, finally craning his head to look up at the top of the massive buildings. He had a hard time making out the details with only his eyes, which really said something. "Spectre Kryik, I think… everyone just up and left. There are those tracks on the ground…" Indeed, they saw what appeared to be the marks of enormous tracks and tires, fifteen meters apart, leading away from the small compound toward a much larger compound estimated to be eight hours away in a tank (A/N Using hover tech to avoid trouble and Tracks for a faster acceleration, that's a one-hour trip for the colonists, 600 kilometres). The amount of dirt kicked up suggested ridiculous haste. Another building sat at the back of the settlement, a squat, blocky building, also apparently locked down.

"I agree, soldier, now, is anyone else reminded of a zombie apocalypse vid?" Nihlus commented, looking up at the, what he guessed were, residential buildings.

Every Turian concurred. One of them started trying to hack into a side door, his Omni-tool shut down with a burst of sparks. The next tried to open a different door. Nothing happened. Nihlus sighed and said "Saren, it is safe, the place seems abandoned, all the buildings are secured, locked down apparently, we'll get nothing here, we'll need to press on toward the larger population centres."

"Damn, I was hoping we'd at least find out what these aliens look like." Saren's voice said "Wait, stand back from the entrance to the compound, I'm sending in an APC to pick you up, then we're giving this place some clearance and lobbing a Landcruiser shell at that door."

"Sounds like a plan to me…" Nihlus's group backed away from the opening in the wall enclosure, allowing an APC to pass through safely, before clamouring onboard and backing out of the compound. One of the Landcruisers opened up once they'd reached a safe distance. The shell slammed into the doors on one of the buildings and… nothing. Absolutely nothing happened. Another shell flew downrange and hit the same point. Again, nothing happened, the mass accelerator shell simply bounced off the armour (and structural fields) of the door like a plastic ball would have.

"Okay then… never mind, we'll just press on toward the Tertiary Population Center" Saren said, blinking, trying to tuck his mandibles in. Looking at his old friend, he opened a private channel "Uh, Nihlus, Spectres don't drool in front of their troops, you're lucky no one noticed."

"Sorry." Nihlus closed in his mandibles, and then cleared his throat to snap his troops out of their stupor. "We are pressing on towards the nearest larger Population Center, we'll be airlifted, so don't worry about time."

* * *

"Well, good thing those idiots never figured out what the Omni Sensors were after I shut them down, nor the Guardian SMDs, or even the hideously obvious T3 Power Generators, that'll make life easier for me when I kick them off their dozens of separate beachheads." A small "ding!" signalled the completion of another Network Node, by manual assembly, on the other side of the planet, she could now field an extra 250 units, bringing her count to 750, "Excellent," _It's great to have Atlantis-class Carriers and Air Staging Facilities in the Continentals' path,_ she thought, looking at camera footage of the aliens, they looked somewhat like Seraphim, with reverse-jointed legs and a head fringe. These aliens, apparently called Turians, had metallic scales, effective against constant low-level radiation exposure, they had body armour, and they had vehicles well-suited to playing parts in a film about the early twenty-second or maybe twenty-third century. All in all, it would only take about as long as the engineers getting there to kick them off the planet.

The same thing was repeated hundreds of time around the continent. Columns of dozens of Tanks and APCs would find empty settlements with no sign of habitation. (Much to the mirth of Williams) Each Tertiary City had sent out Star Lifters to pick up the trucks of the civilians while they were en route to the cities. Each Tertiary City also had thousands of trucks forming their own convoys, evacuating the populations to the Secondary Cities, of which there were only three on the whole continent, north, east and south of the one Primary City, which was situated on a bay on the western coast of the continent.

So the convoys formed a relay, pouring the population of the continent into the Primary and Secondary cities in a matter of hours. By the time the Turians began navigating their way around the locked-down towns, all the population movements had been completed, be it by truck, underground maglev train, or air.

The Turians bypassed the villages, towns, and tertiary cities after ascertaining that nothing was in them. It was typical lightning war, blitzkrieg. They met no resistance along the way, and they managed to acquire nothing. Emboldened, Admiral Valern chose to move the main encampments closer to the four major settlements that showed life signs, millions of life signs. Air support was deployed in the form of numerous Gunships and atmospheric fighters, as per Turian doctrine: deploy overwhelming combined arms firepower supported by Gunships, and atmospheric fighters if need be.

They expected a cakewalk with the way the outlying territory went down so pathetically easily, they would soon understand what Crusader Williams would later say about the battle: "Overly Stoppable Force, Meet Immovable Object."

The Turians cut off the roads linking the major settlements and the air routes after clearing all the smaller settlements. They surrounded the population centers and planned to begin a direct assault. Williams decided, watching the Turians move like frozen molasses across the continent, and watching her Continental cross the sea at an irritatingly slow pace, that she would microwave some popcorn for the show ahead.

* * *

_Northern Secondary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 10 AM local time, 10 September, 3865_

A klaxon began blaring inside the walls of the Northern Secondary City, Continent Two, of Shanxi. Refugees and Residents alike scrambled for the shelters that had been built, they were rated to stand up to a Yolona Oss detonation, in fear of possible remnant Seraphim Loyalists, Seven Hand Node members and/or Order members.

Erupter-class Point Defences, their bigger cousins, the Oblivions, and Ravagers swung about. Williams did not even bother turning on the Miasma-class Artillery installations or firing the TML-4. She simply let the Erupters open fire on the advancing Turian lines, then the Oblivions, and finally while the Oblivions recharged the Ravagers let fly.

Much to her surprise, the enemy tanks were weaker than expected, one second's worth of Erupter fire could cook one, and one bolt from a Ravager could do the same. The Oblivions, rated at 600 damage per shot compared to the Erupter's 150 damage per second, were simply overkill.

In that moment, hell was unleashed on the advancing Turian armoured columns, hundreds of tanks died every second. The incoming fire didn't even put a real dent (let's face it, 300 damage per second total, 250 recharge rate, and 21000 shield points is NOT a dent) in the shields of the settlement, and she hadn't even switched the planetary defence class shield(s) that formed the core of every Secondary, Primary and Capital city on yet!

She nearly facepalmed thinking of what would happen if she sent Siege or Armoured Assault Bots, or even typical Heavy Armour units, against these Turians. It was almost… wrong, but still, they'd attacked first, and she WAS transmitting, on their channels and in their language, that those who surrendered would not be killed.

* * *

Nihlus had to forcibly wrench his friend's mandibles shut as they watched the progress of the assault numbly and in shock. Communications required yelling, as every radio channel was flooded with the message of "Those who do not shoot will not be shot." And it seemed to be true. One Landcruiser had not opened fire until it was almost up to the wall, and seemingly under the shield. It had scored a solid hit on one of the enemy turrets, which did not do shit to said turret, even though it seemed to be the smallest turret the enemy fielded, and promptly been blown to smoking, melted pieces.

The field commander finally called a retreat, his Landcruisers backing out of the apparent range of the defence guns, because the guns fell silent then, and then ordered massed fire on the shields in the hopes of breaking through.

* * *

"Damn that fucker, I give your men a chance to live and this is how you repay me?" Williams toggled her Point Defences, all of them, across all three cities currently under attack, to Bombardment mode. The Turian tanks were utterly shredded under the onslaught of quantum resonance plasma, plasma pulse (Erupter), and Plasma Chaingun. They started another orderly retreat, using destroyed hulks as cover, which unfortunately for the Turians did not buy them much time. The only thing that saved the last few badly damaged tanks from being torn to pieces was the slow reloads of the Oblivion and Ravager and the terrain constraints. That and the relatively low range of the Erupters, being effective only to about three kilometres while Oblivions could easily pull off almost nine and Ravagers up to around eleven, depending on terrain.

"These Turians are quite disciplined, any human crew would be running like whipped dogs… so I guess I won't be using the Miasmas on them... on second thought, never mind." Artillery ranges were now far more than they had been in the Infinite War. T2 Artillery Installations could easily pull off around 60 kilometres, T2 Mobile Missile Launchers about 30 km, and T3 Mobile artillery about 50. Light Mobile Artillery remained fairly low in range, only about eight kilometres, due to the fact that they were mortars. T3 Artillery pieces were now truly strategic in range (though most units move so fast artillery is not all that useful against them), a whopping 360 kilometres. The Salvation and Mavor could pull off Strategic strikes and function as anti-orbital weapons, however the Salvation could only hit low orbit, the Mavor could be programmed to be a full scale planetary defence weapon.

_Well, I gotta give them credit on use of terrain. But they're just too slow, there is no way in hell a unit in the Coalition's arsenal is going to even be hit by a Ravager at over four kilometres range, or an Oblivion at three, or an Erupter at over 1.5 klicks._ Williams thought as she watched the Turians retreat again, further this time. She turned the Miasmas on to Standard Fire with an evil smirk; she was done with her kind act of the day. Normally she might have extended some small mercy, but hey, it's called PMS-ing for a reason!

* * *

Saren was suddenly thankful Nihlus had insisted they hang back near the rear of the formation and observe using a camera drone hovering above their heads. This whole debacle would probably have caused him either death, serious physical harm, or to piss himself if he had been caught in the middle of it. They kept moving away, the orders of an orderly retreat not really applying to the two Spectres, as a number of glowing shells flew high into the air behind them. Saren and Nihlus watched as the blazing blue balls of light, somehow far more insidious-looking than the similarly glowing balls of light fired by the enemy medium turrets, as they called them now, come crashing down behind them. Several Landcruisers were caught in the impacts and immediately went up in funeral pyres, while clouds of green rose up from the impact craters. A Landcruiser behind them drove through one such cloud and slewed to a halt, its hull glowing and melting, then blew itself apart, bits of shrapnel peppering nearby Landcruisers, which were desperately trying to avoid the clouds. Several glowing yellow slugs smashed down into the clumps that resulted from the evasion and blew the Landcruisers there utterly asunder.

"Nihlus, thank you for being cautious." Saren said in a very small voice, slumping down into his seat, away from the view port. "I sure am glad we didn't get caught in THAT mess…"

"Yeah, it was a lot scarier, and freakier, than that time a Justicar chased me across an entire planet… just because the target I was sniping moved at the last minute and I shot a bystander before I pegged the bastard." Nihlus said when Saren looked at him inquisitively.

"For some odd reason I have a feeling things are going to get a lot worse…" Saren said quietly. "And by a lot I mean something along the lines of those overpowered turrets growing legs and hunting us." He had no idea how close to the truth of the matter he was getting.

* * *

_Ocean Two, 10 km altitude, Shanxi, 11 AM local time, (2 Time Zones from Continent Two, 3 Time Zones from destination) 10 September, 3865_

In the empty cockpit of the Continental-class transport, fed shield energy through a series of relays on convenient, man-made islands, instruments bleeped as the great aircraft sped through the fringe of a series of Tropical Storms and entered the edge of one of the hurricanes. The rain splattered in sheets off of the bubble-like shield of the huge craft. Lightning, jumping from cloud to cloud, would occasionally race along the edges of the shield, doing almost nothing due to the nature of pulse overcharges, the shorter the duration of damage, the lower the damage, almost regardless of actual energy involved.

The only reason there even WAS a cockpit was for the evacuation of settlements, a single Continental could carry up to 28 trucks or 5600 people to safety at a time, and that was without any crowding in the trucks, only 200 people per enormous, multi-storey truck. With crowding, a single Continental could pull up to a maximum of 10800 people within standard evacuation parameters. In truly desperate times, as in "Strategic Launch Detected" times, a Continental could hold 800 people within its hull and up to some 21600 in trucks.

But this time, the Continental was not evacuating anything, merely processing the simple command of "Get from Point A To Point B, Refuel when needed, unload cargo" Its cargo was a group of six of the new T3 Engineers, Cybran Model, each armed with a two-gun turret taken from the older Rhino Heavy Tank, which had now evolved into the three-gun Rhino Medium Armour. The final four cargo clamps, two on each of its hull columns, were taken up by Ascendant-class T2 Flak. Though most commanders preferred Bangers for their concentrated damage and higher firing rate, and less overkill, Ascendants were slightly better than Iashavohs, and were, like Iashavohs, Amphibious. This put it as the best for amphibious campaigns.

The Continental's systems bleeped again as it detected the approaching storm front; the first part of the hurricane, it and the other Continental accompanying it landed to refuel one last time on an Atlantis-class aircraft carrier, and then began to thread its way around the outer fringes of the hurricane. Once it made it around the northern border of the hurricane, which would soon hit the southern edge of Continent Two, it would reach its destination. Of course, the Continental neither knew of nor cared about the path of the storm relative to land; it merely computed the balance of safest and shortest route to its destination, prioritized to find the ideal route, and followed it.

The screen, watched by no one, silently computed the ETA every ten seconds, briefly showing the numbers 4:00:00 in big, bold red letters, before returning to standby mode.

* * *

_Geosynchronous Orbit, Shanxi, 10 September, 3865, aboard Turian Dreadnought_ Dawn Under Heaven

"Field Master, I believe you should consider sending your forces to bypass the enemy Secondary cities and assault the primary with everything you have, the artillery we are shipping to you included. If you cannot manage this, we will use orbital bombardment. Alternatively, we will soften the Secondary Cities up with orbital bombardment and disruptor torpedoes, the Siege forces stationed at each will then close in and occupy the cities. Your main forces will hide until the enemy military garrison leaves the Primary City to reinforce the Secondary cities, and then catch them by surprise from the rear, while you surround the city. If they do not leave the city, then you will have successfully occupied the Secondary Cities." The Admiral paused his very loud speaking… flag officers were above screaming… as the radio signal began to hash up again "Will someone get that crazy bitch's voice out of the channel?" He roared at his communications officer.

"We are doing everything we can, sir, the signal is just too strong, and it's overwhelming our channels whenever we boost our signal!"

"CAN YOU AT LEAST REDUCE THE VOLUME?"

"YES SIR! That should do it." After cutting down on the signal strength of their own transmissions, the female voice faded somewhat. "As to whether I can eliminate the signal, sir, I cannot." The comm. tech spread his mandibles helplessly.

"Anyway General, consult with your Spectres and devise a plan, I want to see those Cities in Turian talons by local sundown. Use the Gunships we gave you gods damn it!" the Admiral said.

* * *

_East of Northern Secondary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 2 PM local time, 10 September, 3865_

"Do you think I should have informed him of the fact that we lost over 80% of the Landcruisers we committed to the battle at EVERY CITY? It's a futile exercise in my opinion, I think the best thing we can do is probably to get out of here, call in the rest of the Hierarchy fleet, and methodically pound the planet to dust." The Field Master said once he cut the channel, looking glumly at the two Spectres.

"I think we should try using infantry against the Primary City, after all, there's bound to be gaps in the defences, and the towers seem like they are all anti-vehicle, none seem to be anti-infantry… We should get moving right now and attack by nightfall." Saren said "It seemed the enemy towers did not respond to anything smaller than a recon vehicle, which is something we can exploit, hopefully. Otherwise, we may have to call down Orbital Bombardment."

"I agree with Saren, it seems the strategy is the best bet we currently have, though it pains me to admit it, we may have to consign many of our troops to the flames…" Nihlus shook his head slowly, his mandibles twitching in agitation and helplessness.

Defeat was in the air, and it loomed ever closer. If ever there was any chance of at least a temporary Turian victory, it was wiped out as the main body of Turian troops made their way toward the Primary City of this blasted Continent. The plan was doomed to failure, a failure that would arrive in _4:00:00_.

* * *

_The idiots are MOVING THEIR TROOPS? Well, they just threw away any chances of even small tactical victories away, bad for them, more fun for me._ Williams thought as she watched the displays, Omni sensors, more specifically their radar suites, in the Cities showing her the movements of the Turians from some 140 kilometres away. Were the situation not so irritating, cutting into her shore leave, she would have been laughing maniacally while ordering all the city garrisons to move out and smash the Turians behind their own lines, wreaking havoc and preventing them from regrouping by destroying them.

* * *

_Southeast of Northern Secondary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 3 PM local time, 10 September, 3865._

"Prepare our troops for the next operation, we move after dark" In the current season in this southern hemisphere of the planet, sundown would come at approx. 5:30 PM and full dark by 6:15. The field Master laid out the plans in the Command APC. "2nd division will advance along the highway from the north, 3rd division along the north-eastern fields, 4th, 5th, 6th divisions will advance along the other three compass points open to attack. They will hold position outside of the enemy artillery range, which is designated by this ring. The Infantry of the various divisions will close in on the enemy and get under the shield, blow a hole in their defences, then turn this into street warfare. That way, we will be able to advance into the city, bypassing the enemy fortifications, with minimal losses. Gunships will offer close air support to the infantry by flying under the shields, pinpointing and destroying the shield generators, whose approximate location is illustrated by this map our scout aircraft have sent back to us." He highlighted a number of odd-looking structures, between the skyscrapers, that were glowing eerily even on the holographic map.

"What's the codename for the operation, Field Master?" One of the Division commanders involved asked at the end of the briefing.

"We'll call it…" The Turian Field Master paused, racking his mind for a suitably meaningless jumble of noises that would not translate to anything in the Turian language "Operation Barbarossa"

Far, far away, Williams sprayed her popcorn onto her console, which she quickly wiped clean, still laughing at the name the Turians had decided to use, according to a spy drone one of her Spook Spy Planes had dropped. The drone had scuttled under and attached itself to a vehicle, tapping into its communications and internal monitoring systems passively. Apparently, she'd hit the jackpot with the Command APC.

* * *

BEHIND THE SCENES:

My theory on the stupidity of the Council is that they are so unwanted by their own species that they were thrown to the galaxy at large. This also accounts for the way all politicians today behave, they are so evil jails and asylums refuse them entry, so they are thrown to the world at large.

I hope that was enough ass-kicking for one chapter, several thousand tanks lost in minutes… that's gotta hurt. If I could have managed to plausibly make Saren and Nihlus survive, they would have been in the middle of it all, desperately driving their APC (Saren dove out of his just in time before it was hit and brewed up) back in the retreating lines of Landcruisers. They would have been dodging between them to avoid the enemy Tower that had apparently fixated on them and was tracking them. However I deemed this far too implausible considering the OP nature of SupCom Point Defences. A Ravager could cut through to them in no time, Oblivion, even less trouble, the shot Arcs and does SPLASH DAMAGE… Erupters don't have enough range to make the chase truly fun to read, so… yeah.

Also, since the Blitzkrieg here is mainly about taking control of a lot of the Continent really fast, spreading out from dozens of beachheads, there really wasn't as much to write about as I'd hoped. First of all, the civilian casualties had to be low to none to show the power of the Coalition and the practice a thousand years of war have given the people of all four factions (Separatists run, a lot) in evacuations. Second of all, the Turians could not be too slow about the searches and stuff, or Williams would swarm them, or better, send Cybran Combat Engineers (The most popular T3 Engineer, has a 500-point personal shield, high HP, as well as a Two-gun turret) to build walls and turn the Turian Army into a joke (They can repair wall sections and/or each other far, Far, FAR faster than the Landcruisers could ever HOPE to do damage to them, even if they don't bother shooting the Landcruisers to pieces first) Thank you xyzinc for the idea in your review (It was a LMFAO review by the way)

NOTE: Since the Hammerhead Tank from ME 2 is equivalent to (in role, but much weaker armour than) a Seraphim War Era Aurora Hovertank, the Turian tanks have shields that can take 100 damage, then their hulls can take 20. This is being generous, VERY generous, considering an Aurora only has 140 HP and a Sky Slammer (Cybran T1 Mobile AA, only one of its class with missiles not gun) 130.

Thanks for reading, Read and Critique (for the HP and Shield Points speech, refer to Chapter 6), please try not to leave one-line reviews like "Alright, time for pwnage!" Actually comment on specific aspects.

I DO NOT HAVE PROFANITY FILTER! FEEL FREE TO SWEAR. Flamers, if any, will backfire (they're called flamers for a reason…)


	4. Barbarossa

A/N: Most of the Turians think Shanxi is a major colony, if not a major population center, then one of the Primary Agro-worlds of the Coalition. They have no idea that the Coalition of Species takes up just over a quarter of the galaxy (due to a Maginot Line of disabled Mass Relays during the Protheans' final days). Nihlus and Saren are the only ones with any doubt, and half the others think they're mad, why install a space elevator if it's not a primary world? (It IS one of the better agro-worlds on the Coalition _Rim_, but it is by no means a major world, merely a border planet.) The Citadel Races don't even have space elevators except on their homeworlds, and even then only the Asari, Turians and Salarians have even one.

* * *

Chapter 4: Barbarossa

_Capital city, Shanxi, 6 AM Local Time (12 Time Zones Away From the Primary City, Continent Two), 10 September, 3865_

_Excellent, the Continentals will touch down in approximately… one minute, the engineers will be supplementing the small garrison of units in the Primary City, and can get through to the Secondary Cities using the maglev trains, it'll only take them around an hour to get there then. Since I have a Paragon, or rather two, I can build almost infinite factories at will._ Williams thought gleefully as she zoomed in on the general region of the capital city, watching the Continentals close the distance. Technically, she had enough Continentals on the other side of the planet to not only have served evacuation duty but also to pound the Turians into the ground, but she preferred using Ghetto Gunships, the guns on the super-transports weren't that powerful… but supplemented by the firepower of 28 Light Assault bots, it was a formidable anti-ground weapon indeed. The shield protected the fragile bots from Flak, which could scythe them down rapidly, and the bots put out an impressive amount of fire. It was too bad heavier units could not fire off transports…

* * *

_6 PM Local Time, Primary City, Continent Two, 10 September, 3865_

The Engineers immediately began constructing T1 Factories and then assisting them to T2 and then T3. Within seven minutes, twenty T3 Land Factories were online, along with twenty T3 Air Factories, and they began pumping out units as the engineers built more factories, the Paragons on the other side of the planet supplying through quantum transport the needed mass and energy. More T3 Power Plants, adding to the already impressive redundancy of the city's power grid, came online, another Paragon was started, also in the extra area enclosed by the city's walls, intended for just the purpose, but far from the Factories. Now the Network Nodes would take less stress from transmitting such enormous amounts of mass, which the local Mass Extractors could not sustain.

By 6:15 PM local time, a mere 15 minutes after the engineers touched down, the local garrison of units had grown from 10 Titan Siege Assault Bots to over 200 units of various types, mostly Titans, for their more consistent damage output. The Disintegrator Pulse Lasers on Loyalists would be extreme overkill, same for the Thau cannon, primary weapon of the Othuum Siege Tank, and the Harbinger had a slow firing rate with its high intensity laser.

The Titan had come a long way since the Seraphim War, its shield was now boosted in density, though this cost slightly more power, it re-acquired the Rocket Launcher it once sported from earlier in its design, now outfitted with Meson Rockets for high single-shot damage. This put its total DPS (Damage Per Second) at 200. The other Heavy Armour Units, SAB (Loyalist), and Armoured Assault Bots had also received upgrades to their abilities. The Harbinger's shield had become a personal shield and increased in strength, and it had gained an auxiliary weapon, an Electron Bolter. The Othuum had gained structural field strength and fitted another Aire-au bolter on the other side, making it now symmetrical. The Loyalist had gained structural strength and a grenade launcher suite similar to that of the Mongoose T2 Gatling Bot but stronger. The Percival had received a shield, and a Plasma Cannon for a second arm, the same type as that of a Titan. The Brick had somehow acquired a Personal Stealth Suite as well as a Flak gun, in addition to superior actuators giving it somewhat better speed than the Percival.

Every land vehicle could now travel underwater, however only the amphibious ones could navigate deep or abyssal waters, so the ability was restricted to fording rivers and small lakes.

It would be almost comical to watch Operation Barbarossa freeze in its tracks faster than the Germans had frozen in the suburbs of Moscow way back in 1942, but for the fact that Williams was not in much of a mood to be patient. The temperature dropping 40 degrees Celsius in two hours was simply too slow for her tastes.

The moment the clock had struck 5:45, the Turian Army had begun closing in toward the city on five sides, thousands of transports driving closer to the city, using terrain cover to hide from Artillery fire. They dropped off their infantry once they'd reached the suburbs, which was still some 20 kilometres from the city walls. The infantry, aided by the artificial muscle fibres of their armour, had gotten to positions 2 kilometres away from the city by 6:15, scooting from cover to cover, completely, or almost completely, unaware that their cover was effectively nearly useless against Williams' point defences.

She decided to have a little fun with the aliens, just to show them some little things… So, she drove the T3 Combat Engineers forward and ordered them to construct wall segments. It took 1/3 of a second for a T3 engineer to put up a wall segment, and considering each wall segment was 20 meters by 20 meters, about half of the Turian Infantry groups abruptly found themselves walled in by solid, vertical walls. Hooks and grapples had no effect, repulsed by the structural fields of the walls (though the Turians did not know that, just the fact that their grapples never caught on anything), and so, they were trapped. They resorted to shooting at the walls, but considering a tank shell from one of their tanks would do around 10 damage points, their assault rifles, grenades, and small rockets did not even put a real dent in the 4000 points each wall segment had of structural integrity. That, and the fact that unlike before, walls auto-repaired at the rate of 1 per second. Most units and buildings auto-repaired at 5/second.

The combat engineers scooted back to her line at a speed of a little over 200 kilometres per hour as Williams brought out her next set of units: a dozen Rhino Medium tanks, chosen for their width, the fact that they moved along the ground, and unlike the other choices, actually had a high firing rate in addition to the grounding trait. The tanks moved nearly silently over the terrain and began methodically driving back and forth across clusters of Turian infantry. The tanks themselves were a little over 5 meters tall and thus easily ran over hundreds of the aliens, driving effectively with their flanks touching, through the streets, flanks almost scraping the locked-down housing units. Fleeing Turians would have been unharmed, if any had actually fled… Williams didn't give a damn either way.

"It is truly fun to fabricate suburbs for a city just to fool the enemy with… they're wonderful kill zones…" Williams said to herself, fiddling with settings of her units.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, 6:17 PM Local Time, 10 September, 3865_

"Uh, Saren, are you seeing what I'm seeing?" Nihlus said as the camera drone reported more fiascos almost worse than the disasters of the battles in the north, south and east.

"Call in the gunships and get those heavy tanks out of the way!" Saren yelled into his radio, then shook it around uselessly "We've got comm. jamming. You, get back to the close support airfield and tell the gunships to fly close support NOW!" Then he turned to Nihlus "Yes, I'm seeing the disaster too."

"No, I mean how those wall blocks just popped out of the ground when the Armed construction units pointed that beam at the ground. Maybe it was meant to be a trap!" Nihlus said "they must have underground wall blocks everywhere, ready to box in and kill our troops! Call in our artillery!" Another runner went off to call down artillery support for the infantry.

* * *

As soon as the first artillery shells were detected, TML-4 Tactical missile silos opened up, their cycling firing columns pointing into the skies. One missile roared out of each of the four launchers nearest the enemy artillery units, and then the launch towers retracted, leaving the three other missiles on their pylons, unfired. Once they retreated into the silos, the launchers were reloaded and the fabrication of new missiles to replace the gaps in the reserves began. This was, shockingly to the Turians, at the very apex of the skyscrapers that formed the Residential Buildings, just under the enormous shields that covered the city.

* * *

"Well, there goes our artillery, the few shots that hit didn't do shit to those thanks, they must be REALLY tough." Nihlus had no clue how right he was as the cheerful pop-pop-pop of the explosive artillery munitions and vehicle cores cooking off sounded some distance away from the two's observation post. Tough, yes, Rhino Tanks were 400 tons each, 200 mass, and one could be built in twenty seconds by a T2 factory (13 and a third for a T3 factory). Nihlus of course did not know this as over a thousand gunships roared by overhead. Even before the first had reached missile range of the enemy tanks, said tanks collectively turned and rolled back toward the city wall, moving toward the wide gap that functioned as a gateway. Mercifully, the radio jamming was lifting, so they could at least coordinate the gunships effectively.

* * *

Grand Crusader Williams smirked as she turned the communications jamming knob down somewhat. "Well… I hope they notice the SAM batteries and start panicking, it'll make the next stage SO much easier…"

* * *

"GUNSHIPS TURN BACK NOW, SURFACE TO AIR MISSILES DETECTED! TURN BACK! TURN BACK!" Nihlus screeched into his omni-tool's comm. array, "Saren, we gotta move!" He grabbed the other spectre, who was still recording footage of the SAM and Flak batteries extending from the terraces of the city's skyscrapers and from the roofs of said skyscrapers.

"Alright, I'm going! I'm going!" He said, quickly scrambling into the Air Transport parked at the back of the secured covert observation post and starting the start-up sequence as the rest of the crew piled in along with their gear. Then the Heavy Lift aircraft accelerated hard, flying away from the combat zone.

"I'll pilot, Nihlus, keep an eye out back and man the rear gun!" Saren said tersely as he strapped the crash webbing on with one hand. Nihlus, right beside him, brought up the holographic interface, having strapped himself in already.

A swarm of hundreds of Nanite Missiles, built to tear enemy aircraft to nanite-sized pieces (hence the name, true nanites were deemed too dangerous to use in such wanton fashion), rose from the towers of the city and then levelled off, flying toward the swarm of hostile gunships. Two missiles could tear a Gunship's shields and hull apart with ease (After all, Turian Gunships were in fact weaker in both firepower and armour than a Jester T1 Light Gunship). One missile was enough to weaken the shields to non-existence and damage the hull; a second would make a Gunship fly apart. Considering each SAM turret was firing 4 missiles per volley, Nihlus counted using his eyepiece, and the fact that the missiles seeked out new targets after their old one was destroyed, and could fly through debris clouds without trouble, two hundred-odd Gunships were blown to pieces in the initial volley of missiles. Flak guns opened up and began to chew away at the Gunships steadily; damaging entire clusters with their munitions, 2.5 seconds of Flak was enough to take down a Gunship, and then another second for the splash to handle the others near it. Another volley of Surface-to-air missiles ripped into the Gunships before they stopped trying to fly under the shields (none had made it so far) and retreated, leaving over 600 smouldering wrecks among the suburban buildings, and on the two-kilometre clear zone outside the city's walls. While they retreated, another volley of SAMs lashed out at them, causing nearly two hundred more to blow apart and fall to the ground as flaming shrapnel.

* * *

"If they think they've gotten away from me then they're in for a nasty surprise." Williams rubbed her hands together gleefully "The wonders of Gemini Fighters…" Indeed, the premier Air-Superiority Fighter of the Coalition was equipped with personal stealth. The Turians had been too busy getting their gunship swarm annihilated to notice a Galactic Colossus on their doorstep, let alone stealthed units, even though most of the missiles had been set to bombardment mode. This mode was usually not used in Coalition campaigns because of the fact that it provided too much time for target jamming suites to neutralize the missiles, and thus was a waste of missiles that could be used against other targets.

She had based the ASFs off a pair of Atlantis Carriers, situated far to the west in the enormous bay, or some would say Sea west of the Primary City, supported by Athanahs, Bulwarks, Sirens, Mermaids and Yathsous (btw that's Seraphim T3 Mobile Shield, which hovers, UEF T2 Shield Boat, Cybran T2 Cruiser, Cybran T2 Stealth Ship, and Seraphim T3 Sub Hunter). The fighters had stealthily made their way around the northern and southern flanks of the city and were now preparing to meet the enemy gunships head-on before they could reach their airfield. Revenant Strategic Bombers, also stealthed, would deal with that piece of property in but moments, before the air search radars and Ladars would even detect the threat.

The icons designating the wings of 50 Geminis each and the hundreds of remaining enemy gunships grew closer and closer, the Geminis approaching the flight path of the Gunships and firing off the first salvo of missiles. Four missiles streaked through the night sky from each Gemini, each fighter picking a separate target. One salvo of four missiles could take down a Gunship, and so Williams mentally logged the total HP of the enemy gunships as between 300 and 400 points equivalent (a single Myrmidon-fired Nanite Missile does 300, and is not enough to kill a gunship completely, each Gemini-fired missile does 100). The second salvo of missiles, flying at a new set of targets, was in the air even before the enemy knew they were under attack. Just under two hundred gunships went down as the night sky was lit up by fire from the chin guns of the gunships, firing backwards, desperately searching for the sources of the missiles.

They didn't have much time to react as Williams' fighters came up on their tails and fired another volley, gunship mass accelerator rounds pinging off structural fields and armour without doing anything, not even scratching the paintjob. However, the flicking of the impacts gave away the fighters' positions, and so the gunships began to try to concentrate fire on the wildly manoeuvring fighters. Williams frowned and sent the fighters to afterburner, it burned up fuel at twice the normal rate, but it WAS much faster.

The pilots of the gunships did not even have time to track their guns before the Geminis, all 100 of them, flew between the gaps in their formation and roared away in the night sky. The pilots triggered their own Anti-Air missiles, but it was too late, as the next volley of missiles, fired by the Geminis, swung back and smashed most of the remaining gunships to pieces. The few that remained chose to bail out instead of waiting around to die, as the final echoes of the transmission "Those who surrender shall live" echoed in their ears.

* * *

"Where in the gods' names did THOSE fighters come from? Radar, Ladar and satellite images detected NOTHING!" The Field Master was furious at the failure of his intel service.

"Sir, we suspect the enemy may have held the fighters under camouflage nets or indoors." One tech said.

The Field Master facepalmed "I wasn't completely serous about where they came from, but none of our sensors, other than direct visual, aka MARK ONE EYEBALL detected jack shit. How could this have happened" (Note: Geminis are able to stealth under Ladar, the Laser version of radar, because it's only a few wavelengths.)

* * *

"Dodge left! Dodge that round—" Nihlus yelled as he guided the rear gun to frantically fire away at the enemy fighter following them. It was one of the smaller models, he was relieved to know, but that did not make it any less deadly as it chewed away at the engine block and rear armour of the Air Transport. Another shudder ran through the heavy craft, another hit or pair of hits.

"I'm TRYING! The goddamn pilot in that craft is just too good! I can't shake him! Take him down with your gun before he takes us down!" Saren yelled, swinging the Transport through as series of manoeuvres it was never designed for and which probably weren't all that safe, the technicians in the back of the transport screaming their collective heads off as the craft did a barrel roll to dodge another twin burst of Autocannon fire.

"He's taking aim for the engine block, swerve… uh oh!" The enemy fighter had finally scored a lucky shot, the inside of the transport, which was skimming the trees in the valley trying to not be shot down and/or to remain inconspicuous, went dark. But that was only for a moment, an audible explosion was heard in the back of the craft, and so Saren Arterius and Nihlus Kryik, old friends and fellow spectres, shared a look in the moment of free fall. Then they screamed like babies as they heard the craft crash through the trees and splash down in shallow water.

* * *

"Well, that one put up a fight." Williams said, sending a Combat engineer and some escort units via Continental Heavy Air Transport to secure the site, which wasn't far from the city. The Prowler-class interceptor pack had done a better job of herding the aircraft than she would have expected. Thanks to the chaos and fighting, none of the aliens bothered leaving the fake suburbs, good, that meant more prisoners. Again she was reminded of the World War Two campaign, over 1900 years ago, that had also been named Barbarossa. The Germans had bypassed many of the towns to strike at Moscow, and so were lethally tied down and destroyed. Hundreds of thousands had been captured in that campaign, and she debated whether to send out Mech Marines and Trucks to capture the infantry. Her final verdict was—no, at least, not yet, let them suffer.

* * *

"Nihlus? Where are we?" Saren asked groggily, stumbling out of the shallow creek they had splashed down in, all the technicians were dead, and the two Spectres had salvaged what they could.

"The city and its suburbs are that way, it's our only chance of catching a ride. I say we take the chance." Nihlus pointed shakily. They took a moment to compose themselves and then moved back toward the city's suburbs, which they could see at the end of the valley.

"Something's coming, quick, hide!" The two ran off through the underbrush as an enormous aircraft, much larger than their transport had ever been, even before the engine block blew, dropped off a number of vehicles, anti-air, tanks, and constructors. The vehicles fell at least five floors' height before landing, but appeared unharmed, much to the Spectres' surprise. The behemoth then held station over the area while the constructor apparently scanned their transport, then, much to Saren and Nihlus' astonishment, apparently _harvested_ it, decomposing and absorbing the transport's materials…

They shared a frightened look: What had the Hierarchy gotten itself into?

* * *

Williams finished the quantum transporter sequence, then she sighed, too bad it was too slow to transmit living organic matter effectively, or nobody would use Quantum Gates for much besides signal and quantum stream regulation. The tech-heads would have a field day with the wreck, now held in stasis in a Science Facility somewhere on-planet. She was waiting for the Turians to make their next move, as well as assembling new bases in the central squares of the Secondary Cities (The Engineers had finally gotten there via maglev tunnels), and building new Control Nodes wherever she deemed appropriate. She could now field an even 1500 units on the other continent. So far, 800-some of those control slots had been taken up by static defence towers (controlled by command bunkers within each major city and directed from said centers when it came to the countryside). She was still irritated at the civilian administration of the planet for placing four Tech 3 Engineers in each village, but it was somewhat counteracted by the fact that Omni Sensors now only took 1500 Energy to operate, so the Villages could still provide shields, Omni, SAM and SMD support if need be. The Turians hadn't even noticed the deactivated, disguised Plasma Cannons, UEF T1 Point Defences, at each village and the other disguised defences at the towns. It would be a nasty surprise for them when she routed them. _Yeah, in other words, when I get tired of toying around with the stupid Turians. _She thought.

It took a while, but just before dawn over on the battlefield… "FINALLY they're moving in again!" the Grand Crusader exclaimed, throwing her arms in the air dramatically. "Well, they're even more screwed than before… might as well turn all the tactical-level defences of the cities on." And so she did.

* * *

_Northern suburbs of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 5 AM Local Time, 11 September, 3865_

Saren and Nihlus had managed to make it into the suburbs in the dark, the countryside lit up somewhat eerily by the glow of the vast city's immense and immensely powerful shields. They had met up with a group of Turian survivors wandering the abandoned housing units and caught some sleep when suddenly the sound of over ten thousand Landcruiser engines woke them. The Turian Army had begun to move around the city to strike at it from the relatively lightly defended coastal roads. Nihlus's and Saren's personal opinions were summed up in one word: "Fuck." Followed by: "We're heading east, away from the battle zone as much as possible, believe me, the Hierarchy isn't as powerful as we'd like to think it is."

Thus was it that the two battered, grimy Spectres and a group of twelve Turian Spec Ops troopers were taking shelter in a house they had successfully broken into. The troops were sleeping on the uppermost floor, Floor 30, in the amazingly soft beds this enemy species apparently preferred. Saren was reminded of the typical Asari bed; it seemed this new species wasn't so different from the ones in Citadel Space after all. Nihlus stayed asleep until just before Dawn when the sounds of combat reached his auditory diaphragms. He jolted awake, unfurling his sniper rifle and pointing the barrel at the window, what his visor showed him in the distance gave him pause.

Thousands of brilliantly coloured bolts flew back and forth across the battlefield, the reddish trails of mass accelerator cannons from the Turian side and blue, green and white trails from the opposing side. The massive shields of the city blocked all on one side, while the Turian side was constantly erupting in explosions and the pop-pop-pop of ammunition, drive cores, and living beings cooking off. Once again, Nihlus wondered at what the Hierarchy had gotten itself into.

"Nihlus, I can tell what you're thinking, and I agree, this war is costing us too much. We need to end this, and end this quickly." Saren said, coming up behind his friend and putting a hand on his shoulder, gripping it for a moment before letting go and checking his armour again.

More rumbling of Landcruiser drives rumbled, this time closer. It seemed that many, many Landcruisers had in fact made it into the suburbs, among the buildings and were making their way through the streets toward the city. The city's shields were flickering, if only slightly, perhaps this would be what was needed?

But it was not to be, as the shields firmed up again, it was merely a momentary fluctuation. The columns of Landcruisers continued advancing along the streets, groups of soldiers walking alongside or hitching a ride on the Landcruisers and APCs that formed the convoys. They were advancing down all the main roads, which Nihlus thought was a relatively less idiotic strategy than advancing through narrow roads, but it was still pretty stupid, considering the natural chokepoints and bottlenecks the roads formed. Saren made a comment "Well, at least the infantry are checking ahead for ambushes and traps…"

* * *

Packed up into the minimum space possible, the Titan Heavy Assault Bot waited, along with twenty-three of its brethren, for the convoys to pass by. The thirty meter tall war machine at the moment was packed into a twenty meter tall space, huddled against a warehouse to avoid detection. For all the world, it looked like a grey steel brick sitting next to the warehouse, waiting to be loaded onto some sort of transport. Only five were outside, the rest were inside the warehouse, fed tactical sensory data by the five outside and the uplinks they each had to the Control Node Network and through it all to the Command Center on-planet. Said Center was currently not an ACU, but instead the Capital City Command Bunker, where Williams had decided to reside for greater comfort.

The Titan knew none of this, and it did not care for any of this. It merely waited for the enemy armoured convoy, driving eight abreast (the main routes could comfortably fit three Titans side by side, each 30 meters wide), to pass. Then it would unpack, charge up its shields to full capacity (when packed, it could only charge to half), and walk up the enemy's rear, destroying all that fired at it or attempted to do so, while broadcasting the message of "Surrender and live" in Turian. Of course, the machine knew not what the audio file meant, merely that it was to be pumped out at full capacity, and it did not care either what it would have to attack as long as it did not bear a friendly IFF tag.

After thirty ranks of enemy tanks passed, and scanners indicated no further enemy presence in the area of any sort, it unpacked, along with its brethren, and they split up, six to each distinct convoy advancing toward the city. Its urban warfare protocols came to life and guided it to carefully walk around the rubble that littered the streets from the previous day's massacre. It then formed up into an appropriate formation for the terrain, two rows of three, and started down the road.

Four Athanahs followed the twenty-four Titans, and each group was assigned two Bangers for Anti-air duty. The general formation was three titans, then the three supporting units, and then another three Titans. The Turians were going to be in for a major shock.

* * *

"Saren, do you feel that?" Nihlus suddenly commented, there was a rhythmic vibration of the ground. Suddenly, Saren nodded and pulled/ordered the entirety of the Spec Ops team they had met up with into an alleyway between two buildings. "What do you think it is?" Nihlus asked.

"I don't know, but it's got to be something big and heavy…" Though Saren did not know it at the time, he was right, big and heavy or the order of a thirty meter tall/wide Siege Assault Bot weighing in at 960 tons.

"I think it's getting closer" one of the troopers hissed in alarm as the rhythmic shaking of the ground grew in intensity. "And pretty fast too, it's taking three steps per second!" He said. A glowing bubble creeped around the housing units on the side street as the rumbling came closer and closer. It was a mobile shield of some sort…

A shadow rapidly grew in the road, and a row of giant grey… _things_ darted past the mouth of the side street, covering the twenty meter distance in a third of a second, followed by another row of objects, then another row of the giant things. The small infantry group was simply ignored as the machines thundered off in the same direction as the Landcruisers had gone, at a little under 200 kilometres per hour. The Turians shared a look, then cautiously creeped over to the mouth of the side street. The ones who looked in the direction the mechs had come from saw nothing out of the ordinary, the ones who looked in the direction the mechs had gone in had their mandibles splayed wide open, staring wide-eyes as the mechs, each six floors tall, marched down the street in a hunched-over form (They would have been), with what appeared to be a mobile shield emitter and two flak vehicles in the combat group roaring along (or in the shield generator's case hovering) at the same speed.

In less than twenty seconds the vehicles and mechs had disappeared into the distance, leaving a shocked group of Turian infantry glumly walking toward the outskirts of the suburbs. The buildings and indeed the whole of the suburbs were not as safe as they had expected.

* * *

Unbeknownst to the Turians, Williams locked down the buildings she'd unlocked for the aliens, after sending engineers to actually fabricate the beddings, consoles, and all the other, completely fake, trappings of daily life, in the fake suburbs. The aliens, the vast majority of them, who had not joined up with the tank columns, were now locked inside (though she kept the ventilation systems working) or stuck in the wall enclosures she'd put up around them. They would soon be prisoners of war, as she could deconstruct the buildings around them whenever she chose to. The enemy tank columns were entering her Titans' range, without even noticing the Titans following them.

_Wait, wouldn't the infantry notice the ground shaking?_ She suddenly thought, before zooming in on her monitor, using the superior sight range of the Soothsayer Perimeter Monitoring System to watch the Turians. Apparently the infantry had mounted up in their APCs, some of them even catching rides on the tanks near the outside of the formation. _Well, they are screwed, very, very screwed, can't even feel the vibes with their suspension and vehicles._

* * *

The four Titan groups opened fire simultaneously from behind each of the separate armoured columns, heavy plasma cannon rounds smashing into the enemy shields and shredding them within two hits, the third smashing into the Landcruisers' hulls and blasting through the front of the vehicles, after melting and baking its way through the interior of the tanks, the vehicles completely vaporized from the high temperatures. A volley of Meson Rockets ripped through more Landcruisers. On average, one Titan could kill five or six Landcruisers per four seconds. Thus, in the time it took for the turrets of the Landcruisers to traverse around to fire upon the Titans, the back two rows of Landcruisers died.

The mass accelerator cannons of the Landcruisers opened up as one, firing slug after slug at the glowing shield that protected the enemy walkers without significant effect. The cannons spat out one round per two seconds, dealing the equivalent of 10 damage per round. The two hundred Landcruisers in each of the armoured columns began tearing into the shields, most firing on an angle to hit the shield obliquely near the top, a tactic which did 5 damage to the shield with each slug. The total drain to the shields was around 1000 per two seconds, and considering the regeneration of 150/second for the 10000-point shield, it wasn't much. In the time it took for the shield to be weakened to about 70% strength, fourteen seconds, the formations of Titans had spread out into the squares they were now in. Thus another hundred and five Landcruisers went down.

The rest of the primitive tanks were cut down before the shields hit 50%. All of the enemy armoured units in the fake suburbs had been annihilated, as planned. The enemy infantry would have proven difficult for the immense machines, so Williams sent out hunter groups of weaker units: Mech Marines, supported by Spirit-class Land Scouts, which hovered, and transport trucks for prisoners. The hunter groups began marching into the fake suburbs outside the real city's walls, those who did not surrender would be executed, as usual in war.

* * *

"All clear?" Saren was breathing hard as he slammed his back against the wall next to Nihlus, they had fought their way through a group of three ten-meter-tall mechs armed with dual high-calibre chainguns and one hovering armoured vehicle that was armed with a pulse weapon. The whole of the twelve-person Turian Spec Ops team had been cut apart before the two Spectres finally took down the mechs with concentrated sniper rifle, grenade, mine and rocket fire. They had barely escaped with their lives, the immense shells the enemy guns threw out could cut through personal barriers within three hits, or about a second. "I don't think we're gonna be able to take on another group like that without reinforcements…" He trailed off.

"Yep, all clear, we're within comm. range of HQ, let's call for support." Nihlus dialled his omni-tool for the broadcast and then spoke "HQ, requesting pickup, we're just outside the suburbs, requesting an APC for pickup. This is Spectres Nihlus Kryik and Saren Arterius, signing off."

"Alright, now we wait." Saren said, taking cover in an enclosure in front of one of the buildings as more Landcruisers rolled by, heading in the opposite direction to engage the enemy, and to investigate the sudden radio silence of their comrades. Saren and Nihlus had a very good idea of what had happened to said comrades, and neither felt in any way inclined to follow the armoured column. They'd wait for an APC to pick them up and head back to their own lines…

* * *

A few kilometres up above the Turian lines, a massive dogfight was well underway. Two hundred Restorer Gunships and a hundred fifty Gemini Aerospace Superiority Fighters mixed it up with five thousand Turian fighters. Said fighters were running interference for the newest wave of two thousand Gunships, also escorted by fighters, a thousand of them, which unfortunately would not have much of a chance of reaching their destination… with the next decisions by Operational Command.

* * *

Grand Crusader Williams was mildly impressed to say the least by the sheer determination, and of course sheer stupidity of these Turians, but she felt the tingly feeling that told her it would be bad to push the enemy too hard before she could drive them from orbit. Now, she had a fleet of 75 Corvettes and 50 Frigates in the sky, and she was almost ready to launch her assault.

"Enemy Ships in orbit are turning toward the planet, especially the big one!" An officer reported.

"Oops, I guess I pushed the enemy too hard, but I guess losing eight thousand tanks and over a thousand gunships in one day would piss off anyone, anyone except a true Commander with ACU technology." Williams covered her mouth slowly with a hand, and smirked "So be it, if they fire, we'll shoot back."

* * *

_Geosynchronous Orbit of Shanxi, over Continent Two, 7:00 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

"Alright, this fiasco has gone on for long enough… prepare the fleet for orbital bombardment, we're taking out one of the secondary cities for payback, mass bombardment will overwhelm those shields with a little time…" Admiral Valern was gouging trenches in the armrests of his command chair by this point, staring at combat footage from the groundside troops. "Kill them, kill them all!" His fist came down on the transmit button and he began his communication "All captains, our soldiers groundside are taking horrific losses from the enemy, over eight thousand Landcruisers and APCs have been lost, and over a thousand gunships and a thousand of our atmospheric support fighters, more are being lost as we speak. This madness must end; we will bombard one of the secondary cities into oblivion and demand surrender from the enemy planetary defence commander, holding the rest of the cities and their inhabitants hostage to help them make their decision."

"Are you sure that would be wise Admiral?" The Field Master, also in on the discussion, asked with worry in his voice, his mandibles twitching in agitation. "My forces have lost a quarter of their number in one night of fighting, I doubt bombarding a city to rubble will help us achieve victory. If anything, the enemy will fight harder and start deploying even heavier weapons than the behemoths they already use on the ground, though it is difficult to imagine, I fear for the Expeditionary Force if you agitate them into launching an offense." The Field Master finished, starting an uncomfortable silence.

"I don't think so; I think they'll be unwilling to just let so many millions of people die to continue the fight." One of the senior Captains said. "I say we go ahead…" He, like every other Turian, had no clue of the billions that had died in the thousand-year-long conflict known as the Infinite War

* * *

A/N: The Turians landed around 32,000 Landcruisers and APCs in total, plus 5,000 Gunships and 10,000 fighters. This would constitute an overwhelming force by the Turians' standards. Matching up to Supreme Commander Units… let's just say that about four Landcruisers would balance out a Striker, Mantis or Thauum (the three T1 light tanks) or 2 to 3 for an Aurora (T1 Light Hovertank, Aeon). That's units with about 300 HP with 24 DPS (damage per second) equalling 4 Turian Landcruisers (dealing 10 damage per shot, every 2 seconds, 120 HP)

Do the math: 1 Landcruiser in 1v1 can do 30 damage with 3 shots, in 4 seconds, as a Striker fires once per second (24 damage) and the first shot for both is at Time 0. 2 Landcruisers will do in 9 seconds 9 shots, 90 damage. Add a third and it equals 160 damage in 14 seconds (8 plus 5 plus 3 equals 16 shots), Add a fourth and it's 260 damage in 19 seconds (10 plus 8 plus 5 plus 3 equals 26 shots). This is not even enough to kill a Mantis, the lowest health of the three heavier T1 tanks, at 280 HP.

Considering the range superiority of the Aurora and the fact that it HOVERS (thus allowing it to stay out of range over water) and the fact that the Aurora needs 3 hits, 1.5 seconds cool down, it can also match up to 3 Turian Landcruisers easily.

After that little tidbit, consider the following: A Titan Siege Assault Bot can dole out one 200 damage rocket per four seconds plus three plasma bolts each rated at 50 damage points every second. It has 1500 Structural Integrity and 2000 Shield Strength… (I changed the numbers a bit) Think about it.

Experimentals will grow somewhat tougher as well, so expect Day of Infamy to feature them heavily, unlike this chapter, where Williams is feeling like being nice and holding back. She's also being merciful, or she would have sent a Zthuee to kill all the Turians in the wall enclosures, who are relatively safe from harm at the moment. One artillery shell from a Zthuee could fry all of the Turians in an enclosure with its spread and splash damage, without doing very much to the walls.

Anyways, I look forward to writing and posting Days of Infamy, read and critique!


	5. Day of Infamy

A/N: Shout out to reviewers: Expect the occasional SupCom 2-like unit or change, but don't expect all those cheap experimentals to pop up anytime soon, or most of the tech tree system, there may be optional shield installations or upgrades for most units T2 and up, but that would be about it.

There was a reference to SupCom 2 in the very first (Prologue) chapter of the prequel, which was formerly the first 7 chapters of this fic (try to spot it), and there may have been more in the next 6 Chapters (detailing Seraphim War events, a sort of prelude to this fic).

Also, those who prefer character interactions to detail, I have this answer: We're not at Mass Effect 1 yet, total ass-kicking with one commander versus an entire Turian Army doesn't leave much space for character interactions besides Saren and Nihlus, the two Spectres that were sent with the fleet.

* * *

Chapter 5: Day of Infamy

_Geosynchronous Orbit of Shanxi, over Continent Two, 7:15 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

The ships of the orbiting Turian Fleet discharged the small moon of Shanxi, on a path that would aim it at the Northern Secondary City of the continent, just north of the equator of Shanxi. They had altered the path of the moon by focusing all the mass effect fields of all the ships (and by grounding the charges to Shanxi's magnetic field). The city was 1500 kilometres north of the Primary City and on a Strait in the northern side of the continent, where a narrow stretch of sea separated a part of the continent, essentially a very large island, from the rest. The Southern Secondary city bordered an isthmus of similar size to Spain, connected to the continent by a narrow land bridge, much like Panama on Earth connected the Americas. The Eastern one was inland.

* * *

_Shanxi Planetary Command,_ _Capital city, Shanxi, 7:26 AM Local Time (12 Time Zones Away From the Primary City, Continent Two), 11 September, 3865_

Williams was pissed.

That was the nicest thing one could possibly say about the woman at the moment, besides "merciful". She would keep the Turians who were locked up in the suburbs of the Primary City alive, but only for intel and interrogations, not out of kindness anymore, their kind didn't deserve any. They had chosen to unleash the beast that was Asteroid Warfare. Well, they managed to for once do a proper job, and they would have to pay for it.

She opened up a channel to the civilians under her protection, all across the planet, Television Channels, Internet sites, Public Address systems, all was turned over to her speech "Today, September Tenth, 3865, a Date that will live in Infamy…" It was good to be a history geek… "The Turian Hierarchy chose to employ Asteroid Warfare against the Coalition of Species Colony of Shanxi, a heinous act never before committed by even the most atrocious of terrorists. Though 35 million lives, Human, Seraphim and Drell were lost, it will be shown, on this day, in this very minute, that the Coalition will protect its citizens from further harm; the Coalition will repulse the invaders, and take back what is ours. Most importantly, the Coalition WILL triumph, as we triumphed over the Seraphim Loyalists, the Order of the Illuminate, and the Seven Hand Node! Now, all you citizens, I, Grand Crusader Ariel Williams, ask you to bear witness to this, bear witness as the Turians suffer the wrath of the Coalition, watch as the Turians suffer your wrath!"

Williams' fist came down on the launch button for the Yolona Oss Experimental Strategic Missile Launcher that resided in the Primary City, and switched the Mavors in all the cities to anti-orbital duty. The Turians would now know the fury of a pissed-off Coalition Commander; it was time to bring out the experimental units. No more niceties, no more playing around, no more mercy that was beyond what was expected of a Commander.

* * *

_7:26 AM Local Time, Primary City, Continent Two, 11 September, 3865_

The Yolona Oss Began to glow with energy, bands of light lighting up on each of the four prongs of the Endgame Weapon (Referred to as a Game-Ender in simulators) before the immense missile, emerging from underground, was launched at a speed of 10 kilometres per second, instantly accelerating to 200 kilometres per second with its mass reduced to the actual 24000 tons of the missile instead of 100 times that amount. (A/N: the missile costs 200 mass per second to construct now for the 1-minute build, I thought the discrepancy between it and a standard strategic nuke in cost was simply ridiculous, so I changed it a bit.)

The missile, upgraded to a one-gigaton warhead from the 500 Megatons of the Seraphim war, sped upwards using its quantum impulse engines as well as mass-adjusting fields to accelerate itself to 2000 kilometres per second. At this rate, it would reach geosynchronous orbit in less than half a minute. Doom was not far away for the Turian fleet, which could not detect the missile with its stealth coating, possessed by all strategic missiles (Which was why only Omni and visual sensors could detect Strategic missiles in flight reliably)

* * *

When the sensors of the Spook-class Spy Planes finally penetrated the dust cloud, they found nothing but a glowing impact crater, as the city's abrupt silence had made Williams predict. The one hundred kilometre wide impact crater marked the first deployment of weapons of mass destruction in the Turian War; it would be far from the last. Planetary defence shields may have been extremely tough and able to take a two gigaton impact, but an asteroid was simply too much. The Mavors and Salvations in the city hadn't even gotten a chance to aim up properly before being vaporized by the high-speed, immensely heavy asteroid.

All across the continent's three cities still in Coalition hands, Mavors came to life and took aim into the skies. A Salvation also prepared for firing in each secondary City, while the Primary City had two Salvation artillery pieces rise and begin to take aim at the Landing Zones of the Turians. The beachheads were hundreds of kilometres away, but no matter, a Salvation could pull off a 1200-kilomtere shot, just like a Scathis or Mavor, though a Mavor could in fact reach up to about 10000 kilometres when excess power was available.

In the villages, towns and minor cities the Turians had bypassed, machinery came to life, T3 Power Plants came online, then Shields, and finally the defences. Engineers transported under cover of night and the stealth systems (a new add-on since the Seraphim War) of Dragon Fly-class T2 Transports had set up a Land Factory at each Town, and a pair of Land and Air factories at each minor city. They had used Deceiver Stealth Generators to covertly set up Twilight-class Stealth Field Generators, using some of the local mass extractors and backup (T2) Power Generators to fuel their construction efforts. With the number of now-established Control Nodes on the continent, Williams could field an army 3500-unit strong. However there was a cap to how much enhancement Control Nodes could yield, the limit was around 5000 total units, including however many the Command Units and Bunkers could support. This was why she used mostly mobile units for the new defences of each settlement, they were simply more flexible and in some cases powerful than static defences (That's what happens when you only field Brick Armoured Assault Bots, Serenity T3 Heavy Mobile Artillery, Athanahs and Bangers). The only static defences she put in were Ravagers, as the residential towers featured a classic Steeltip Node design, including the SAM batteries, flak and an optional Tactical Missile Launcher all in one tough package.

* * *

_7:26 AM Local Time, East of Primary City, Continent Two, 11 September, 3865_

It didn't take as long as expected before the APC came to pick the two Spectres up. They managed to get a lift back to their lines without further incident, thankfully, until they realized the ground had begun to shake. They stuck their heads out of the APC's hatches for a good look at what was causing it, and their mandibles almost flew apart in shock. An absolutely enormous machine, on six tall, powerful-looking legs, had walked out of the shade of one of the skyscrapers. It was clearly visible even from kilometres away, a testament to its size, 160m tall according to the eyepieces the Turians wore. It bore an immense barrel upon the top, along with two menacing-looking guns near the front in two turrets. The immense barrel upon the top of the machine angled down slightly toward the now nearly silent suburbs and Turian Army elements, and then a blindingly bright red beam came from the barrel. It cut through the buildings like a hot knife through butter and through everything else in its way with ridiculous ease, the Landcruisers and infantry simply vaporizing before the beam's immense power. The two guns on its front twinkled continuously, laying down a barrage of lethal fire, cutting Landcruisers to bits with a single glancing blow and tearing down cover like it was nothing, in conjunction to the red beam of pure death.

An object moved into the sky on a pillar of light in the distance, then several other objects, streaks of light, surpass it. Nihlus' comment was "What the flying fuck, literally by the way, was that? Or rather, were those?" Saren shrugged, not knowing either.

"I don't think it's something that bodes well for us, whatever those things may have been."

Nihlus slapped the back of the other Turian's helmet "Well duh, could you have told me something I didn't know?"

"Well while you were taking a nap the fleet bombarded the secondary city to the north… We still have no idea how that turned out." Saren said, now irritated.

"I'm guessing not too well?" Nihlus asked Saren, who immediately facepalmed.

"Now who's being obvious? Since when has anything we've done on this planet actually gone right? The whole thing went to hell right from the start, when we had to land on this continent first because the biggest one was too well-defended by that space elevator's fortress!" He gestured with his arms as the APC sped up noticeably, the driver having finally noticed the gigantic six-legged walker behind them, which was trundling along at 180 kilometres per hour. In reality, it may or may not have had to do with Saren kicking the driver's fringe (on purpose) and thus causing him to look at the rear display, showing what was to the rear of the vehicle. The unfortunate side effect of the acceleration was the two Spectres suddenly slamming against the edges of their hatches as the tracked vehicle was pushed beyond the speed it was rated for.

"Ow, that actually kind of hurt." Nihlus said, rubbing his fringe, which he'd slammed into the hatch cover after he'd bounced off the back rim of the hatch. All Turian Army hatches opened with the covers forward to provide some measure of protection.

"Thanks, Medium-Group Leader Obvious!" Saren said, rubbing one mandible and his side, which had also been bruised by the sudden acceleration.

* * *

_Geosynchronous Orbit of Shanxi, over Continent Two, 7:27 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

"Have all the frigates and cruisers take cover behind our shields, at this range, it seems the anti-orbital fire is inaccurate, and we can dodge it effectively and not take much damage if the smaller ships remain in our shield shadow or in our shield itself." Admiral Valern ordered, gripping the armrests of his command chair.

"Sir, optical sensors detect a heavy-frigate sized object rapidly closing in on us, spooling up weapons…" The Sensor tech shouted as something came up on his optical scanners.

"Guardian Lasers firing, direct hits, no apparent damage registered, it appears to be a very huge missile…" The weapons tech screamed as he rapidly tapped commands, warming up all possible auxiliary guns and bringing them to bear on target. The cruisers also did their best to track the immense missile on its course, but its speed proved too much as most of the shots went side, the few that hit bouncing harmlessly off the structural fields and shields of the missile. Structural fields that could withstand close-range mini plasma jet detonation (that is what the antimissiles use) were completely unfazed by the projectiles. The shields, designed to deal with heavy Surface-to-air missiles barely even felt the projectiles bouncing off as the Yolona Oss Missile crossed the final stretch of distance in two seconds, its mass adjustment fields shutting down and the missile slowing, and detonated against the shields of the _Dawn Under Heaven_.

Five hundred thousand megatons TNT equivalent of raw destructive energy was unleashed in a narrow cone, thirty degrees in spread. The force of the shockwave smashed solidly into the shields of the _Dawn Under Heaven_. The mighty dreadnaught's shields resisted the blast for half a second before being overwhelmed, the ship utterly vaporized even before its Element Zero Core could overload and explode. The cruisers and frigates that were hiding in its shadow caught the remaining energy of the blast, 12 of the 39 Cruisers and 35 of the 47 Frigates being reduced to burning scrap before the energy finally splashed against and was stopped by more shields. The remainder of the fleet chose to spool up their jump drives and get the hell out of there, and one by one, they oriented themselves and jumped to an area just outside the Shanxi system's Oort cloud.

The bedraggled remains of the fleet met up with the fleet tenders, troop transports (now empty) and their escorts at almost the same time as 80 Alien Frigates and 50 Alien Cruisers entered normal space, simply appearing in flashes of light.

* * *

The remaining Turian Fleet Elements put up a good fight, but the heavy weapons of the Frigates and even the Proton Cannons of the Corvettes were simply too much for their badly damaged shields to handle. Williams nodded as she absently noted the result of that confrontation. Then she stet about the task of turning Shanxi into even more of a deathtrap than it already was for the Turians… speaking of which, it was time to deal with that Gunship fleet coming toward the city, along with a good thousand of those WEAK fighters. She was right to call them weak, after all, she only lost a little over a hundred and fifty Geminis and Restorers in that entire battle, 200 Restorers and 150 Geminis versus FIVE THOUSAND enemy fighters. Those that fled in the end, twenty-three in all, weren't even hunted down, she didn't bother. With all her air factories, her losses could be replaced in mere minutes; there was no real point bothering to hunt down such a small number of the enemy.

It was about this time that the first Mavor shells started slamming home. The first main Turian Base's 48 Troopships were all written off in three volleys, considering she had 4 Mavors in the Primary City and 2 each in the remaining Secondary Cities. A Mavor shell landing between two closely parked Troopships could, much to Williams' pleasure, wreck both, the whole lot was gone before they could even get shields up. The second main Turian Base at least got their troopships into the air before they were smashed back to the ground by Mavor fire, one meticulous slug per troopship. This was thanks to the ability to fire at different angles allowing for more-or-less simultaneous landing of shells.

The Turian Army was now grounded and completely at her mercy. Her next step was almost sadistic: use the Salvation Rapid-fire Artillery installations to rapidly annihilate the remaining armoured units the Turians still had, around 20,000 tanks and APCs. The bomblets used by Salvation munitions could each cut through three of the weak Turian tanks by landing on the one in the middle. The net result of this was the utter annihilation of over a hundred Landcruisers and APCs with each shell's 42 bomblets (7 hexagonal formations of 6 shells each packed into warhead). The four Salvation installations on the Continent could each fire once per three seconds, so it took less than three minutes before every tank the Turians had in their motor pools were scrapped, using creeping barrages from each of the entrances of said motor pools.

The next toys she brought out were the Monkeylords, cutting through the Turian Army units like a hot knife through butter and clearing out (she'd always preferred the term to cleansing) the fake suburbs she'd put up. (A/N Think of the various Residential Structures you see in-game, the fake suburbs look like those things) She almost felt sorry for the Turians, almost. Then she grinned and let loose the Soul Rippers and CZARs she had prepped and ready. Their first target would be the encroaching fleet of gunships coming from the east.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:30 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

Pilot Faran Arterius considered himself a fairly decent pilot, having out-flown all the other cadets back in training and participated in the taking down of ten or twenty mercenary operations since then. His job paid well, and his father was very proud of him. Even though he was a good pilot, to be frank, the enemy's fighters scared the SHIT out of him, even the smallest ones; they could take down gunships with ridiculous ease while shrugging off return fire as if it was nothing. They were also stealthy, the big ones, and could fire on and kill you before you had a chance of spotting them, especially at night, thus he was relieved to see the sun rise behind them. It was always a good tactic, coming out of the sun, because it at least hampered visual sensors, if not radar, and they were low enough to the ground to get under radar coverage… so why did he have a sense of impending doom?

The fleet of 2000 gunships and their fighter escorts crested a ridge, and as one the Turians' mandibles opened and their jaws dropped. Three enormous disks, with no apparent means of propulsion, moved at a stately speed toward the Turians. As one, the Turians triggered their air-to-air missiles along with the ground-attack missiles and rockets of the gunships, aiming for the massive disks, which abruptly sped up and smashed head-on into the munitions. Blue ripples of energy blossomed over its surface as a shield absorbed the impacts. _Why does everything big these aliens build have to have shields?_ Faran thought as he intuitively pulled up and out of formation just before what looked like several concentrated mass effect fields flew through the space he'd formerly occupied. To his lower left, one of his squadron-mates went down as a similar string of distortions swept across his gunship before he could dodge. Several white trails moved out from the massive flying saucer and swerved towards the Turian air fleet.

"Incoming missiles from the saucer, pilots, deploy countermeasures now!" He yelled over his com-link, popping open his own countermeasure pods as she spoke. The countermeasures had very little effect on the missiles, and more of Faran's fellow pilots went down trailing fire or simply blew up in mid-air. "The saucers are trying to ram into our formation, go over or under it!" the air fleet followed his advice without questioning, there was no such thing as rank where life and death were concerned, as they were now.

The gunships fleet effectively flowed around the flying saucer-ship while flaps on the saucer began to open. A hundred fifty new contacts popped up on the radar screens of all the pilots, deployed by the alien carriers, and swung about onto the tails of the gunships. Quad Light Laser bolts and scaled-down Zealot Air-to-Air missiles opened up with a vengeance from the mini-frigates the carriers had deployed (Restorer AA Gunships). Each volley of four missiles took down a gunship, and one second's worth of laser fire could blow one wide open.

* * *

Grand Crusader Williams almost felt sorry for the farmers that owned the land below the aerial massacre, she'd reclaim all the wreckage and clear out the destroyed crops for them afterward. At least it was better than the situation in the Infinite War and Seraphim War, all of them had survived, unlike the two past wars, where the average survival percentage of civilians on a good day was around 60%. The average for missions gone sour or mass invasions were usually single-digit percentages. She had a eighty-five percent of civilians still safe, the two past wars effectively purged humanity of diehard fools who insisted on staying around, and oh was she pissed. Being the Defensive Specialist of the Elite Four made her almost used to easily achieving one hundred percent survival rates for whatever she defended.

She also felt sorry for the Turian soldiers, their leadership were such fools as to send them into this mindless, useless massacre… she frowned, her CZARs were killing off the gunships slower than expected, probably because of the overkill of each volley of the flak guns… She stopped minding that battle for a moment as she coordinated the Salvation and Mavor fire, tracking it over the major highways, which were being used by the enemy, as well as the larger HQs. Salvation bomblets would not do much to the roads, considering their high structural integrity, but everything ON the roads that belonged to the Turians would be _erased_…

She looked back at the screen and once more began to crunch popcorn, as she watched the Temporal Fizz Launchers (aka flak) of the CZAR and the Zealot missiles deployed by her aircraft methodically tear down the enemy gunships and fighters mercilessly. A wing of completely unneeded Geminis swooped in from above and began their own attack from all directions. _The Turians, by this point, are very, very screwed, _that was her professional opinion.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" _That Turian's got balls_, Williams thought, then checked that all the CZAR's internal systems were completely locked down as they were by default. She unlocked two and only two doors.

* * *

Faran Arterius was in, to quote his father's best friend and fellow Spectre, Nihlus Kryik, some _deep_ shit. His head hurt from where it had slammed into his seat, before he had made a manoeuvre of desperation, trying to shake the twenty-some missiles that had locked on to his gunship (and which he'd already dodged two passes of). Said manoeuvre consisted of levelling out as he reached landing bay level of the flying saucer and flying into the gaping maw that was the hangar bay. The missiles promptly scattered and went after other targets once he'd done so. After taking a calming breath, he grabbed his Assault Rifle and popped the cockpit, jumping out and landing on the floor with a thump. It was pointless to try to be stealthy, because it was rather obvious that there were at least six cameras tracking him inside the bay. He moved cautiously toward a door, and then made a motion as if to open it, before darting behind a crate and using only his Assault Rifle's gun cam interface to look down at the corridor that had just been exposed.

He stalked down the corridor silently, looking around at the glowing green consoles and aesthetically pleasing circuitry patterns, being constantly reminded of Asari warships he had visited in the past. The door consoles, however, remained solid red, all except one, which glowed affirmative green. After he had made a lap of the center of the saucer, a trip of at least three hundred meters, he approached the only open door, on the inside of the ring-shaped hallway, entered, and abruptly had the door slammed shut behind him. Faran jumped so high he almost smashed his head against the ceiling, and then twitched again when a holographic message popped up in front of him.

"Welcome to one of the CZAR-class Flying Fortresses fielded by the Coalition of Species. Our member states include the United Earth Federation, Cybran Nation, Aeon Illuminate, Seraphim Republic and The United Nations of Drell. The CZAR you are currently on was built in 1minute by a crew of 15 T3 Engineers…" The automated voice and external footage of the flying saucer he was now on faded, but Faran was far too busy to notice, his mind echoed with the name of the last member species mentioned as well as the build time of the massive construction he was now on. Inside the saucer, no, CZAR, he could not even tell the thing was moving, nor tell that there was a massive battle outside, this pointed to extremely advanced technology. It appeared superior to the inertial compensators and mass manipulation fields onboard even Turian fleet Dreadnoughts in power, and the ship wasn't even as large as said dreadnoughts… And the DRELL? Weren't they supposedly extinct except for the relatively population on Kahje, the Hanar Homeworld? What had the Hierarchy and Council gotten themselves into? A ONE MINUTE BUILD TIME?

A hologram popped up of a pale-skinned Asari with fur on the top of her head instead of ridges. Faran immediately concluded this was either a Seraphim or one of the other three Species in the Coalition. After all, every known species in Citadel Space except for the Krogan had a government that governed the entire species "Hello, Turian, before, you ask, I am a human, Grand Crusader Ariel Williams of the Aeon Illuminate, humans are the primary species in the United Earth Federation, Cybran Nation and Aeon Illuminate, and are one of the three founding species of the Coalition of Species, alongside the Seraphim," an image of an alien that looked like a skinny version of a Krogan, with Turian-like mandibles, popped up, followed by another photo, this one of a Drell "and Drell. You are now a Prisoner of War and are free to access the console in your room for greater knowledge of the Coalition of Species in the interest of reaching an understanding and ending this pointless conflict." Faran was by this point bewildered, was this furred Asari—no, Human, offering to surrender? Why didn't she simply surrender to the Field Master or Hierarchy Fleet? With increasing curiosity, he approached the Console and began to read. The first files he drew up were history files, after all, it was easiest to understand a species if you understood their history. One of the other reasons he was doing this was because he had absolutely nothing else to do, locked up as he was, with the ventilation shaft above him silently giving him air to breathe and an alcove in the wall providing water, his emergency rations would have to feed him for a while…

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:37 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

The APC had swerved off the road as soon as Nihlus and Saren had spotted the shell coming down from the skies ahead. They had managed to get far enough away (slamming down and sealing the hatches in the process of fleeing from the highway) to get the APC stuck in a ditch. This was the only thing that saved the APC as the first bomblet, impacting into the dirt on the side closer to the road, flipped it into the air, out of the blasts of the next bomblets, which were also dampened by mud and dirt after the previous day's rainfall. The APC had landed nose-first and crumpled in the dirt, rolling onto its back, the three inhabitants dangling limply in their crash harnesses… That was two minutes ago.

Saren Arterius was first to awaken, checking himself for injuries, then, satisfied, letting himself out of the safety harness. He hit the floor of the APC shoulder-first, letting out a small "Oof" as the wind was knocked out of him. He picked himself up, still somewhat disoriented from the crashes, and checked his friend's vitals, letting Nihlus down and dragging him out of the left side hatch of the APC, which he rammed open using the shoulder plates of his armour. He then checked the status of the APC; the vehicle was still driveable, only needing to be flipped over again. With no risk of a core overload, he went in to retrieve the driver, who was still alive but had a broken arm.

"Did anyone get the registry number of that dreadnought?" Nihlus said, holding one arm up feebly, pointing at the general direction of up—he really wasn't sure if it was up, with a finger. No one answered, so he looked around groggily, until he saw his friend drag the APC driver out of the APC, administering medi-gel and using plates of the armour to set the driver's broken arm. "Hey Saren, are you sure we're still alive?"

Saren, as he'd started to do with alarming frequency since landing on this gods be damned planet, facepalmed "Nihlus, does anything hurt?"

"Yeah, everything hurts." The other Spectre began picking himself up off the ground slowly.

"Okay, is there a smoking, damaged APC right over there?" Saren jerked his right thumb over his shoulder, setting his mandibles and jaw to the left. "And were we riding in it a moment ago?"

"Yeah, we were." Nihlus was too busy trying to get rid of the buzzing in his ears that had started up after he stopped feeling dizzy to think much.

"Does the afterlife feature or is it likely to feature such items? I don't think we've done enough morally evil things to end up in hell, you know!" Saren waved his arms around at the hundreds of meters of charred, scorched ground that surrounded them, trying to get his point across.

"Yeah, okay, I get it, we're not dead, yet." Nihlus said, dusting himself off and composing himself "Let's find something we can use to flip the APC back over."

"Well, we could use that…" Saren pointed at a Landcruiser turret that had landed on the other side of the APC from their exit, being thrown there from a Landcruiser which, also trying to evade the shells, had taken a hit to the engine black not thirty meters away from the final resting place of their APC.

"Saren, if you're thinking of using that turret as a lever, I need to remind you that it would be slightly heavy." Nihlus deadpanned, looking between the wide, bulky turret, sitting upside down in the mud, with what looked like, and probably was, cooked Turian giblets still visible inside, and his mad friend.

"You didn't let me finish, I think we could use THAT pole for the lever, and that turret as the fulcrum. Saren pointed to what appeared to have been a lighting post, stuck grotesquely into the inside of the Landcruiser turret, into the cooked meat that had once been the commander and/or gunner… Nihlus could not tell the difference.

"Oh, alright, though I hope our driver wakes up soon…" Nihlus said, feeling slightly apprehensive and/or ill as he and Saren pried the long pole from the still faintly steaming mass of meat that clung to the inside of the destroyed Landcruiser turret. "By the way, does this in any way shape or form disgust you?"

"What do you think? I may be a Spectre but I'm not a madman, yet… who knows what this war will do to our sanity?" Saren glared at his friend "At least you're upwind of the smell." The smell of cooked meat was disgustingly enticing to the Turian after eating plain rations for the past several days, and he felt his mouth begin to water before a wave of nausea washed over him. Being a Spectre, he swallowed it down and continued with the task of removing the metal beam from jellified, cooked flesh that almost reminded him of the jerky his mother used to make.

"Does this mess remind you of the last real meal we had? Because it sure reminds me…" Saren facepalmed, again, and then threw a one-eyed glare at Nihlus between his fingers for the idiotic comment.

"Did you have to ask?"

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:43 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

Faran Arterius had sat down in the seat provided by the room, and was currently drooling on his chest armour and not noticing, such was his utter astonishment at the information, translated into impeccable Turian, that scrolled down the screen before his eyes. A Thousand Year War between the three human factions, followed by information on a five hundred year struggle by the Seraphim Separatists. He learned of the horrifying facts of the Seraphim War, and the ensuing peace that resulted in the formation of the Coalition. Images from the presented documentary (it was for children, he noted) saturated his thoughts, until he had realized that particular movie had ended and the introductory database was presenting him with a set of choices. He had blankly selected "Military of the Coalition"

"The United Earth Federation, Cybran Nation, Aeon Illuminate, and Seraphim Republic form the vast majority of the Coalition military. Drell personnel usually join via the Cybran Nation or directly joining Coalition Space Command." The computer, speaking in fluent Turian, spoke. A pair of logos sprung up, one featuring a square (or diamond according to angle) with seven smaller squares lining the lower two sides, and the other with five. "These are the two logos that represent the United Earth Federation…" the computer continued on, scenes of puny war machines racing across a battlefield, supported by similarly small fighters and bombers, rolled across the screen, then the camera got up close and personal, with a standard human shown next to the vehicles for scale. This was when Faran began to fear for the Hierarchy's existence, the moment he realized the sheer size of the war machines displayed on the screen in reality. By the time the documentary had reached the Tech 3 units of the UEF he was wondering if the Turian Hierarchy Army on Shanxi should surrender right way to survive, then came the monumental Experimentals, with the Tech 3 units shown beside them for scale. Faran finally slumped in his seat, blankly watching the Cybran Nation, Aeon Illuminate and Seraphim Republic units proceed in a stately dance of battle footage on-screen as one thought echoed in his head: _We are screwed, so very, very screwed_. Even though there were no statistics or schematics included, the ease with which the weapons annihilated terrain objects scared him shitless.

* * *

Williams grinned like a Cheshire cat as she glanced at the footage of the first Turian Prisoner of War. He was broken, good, now if, and that was a very unlikely if, he made it back to the lines of the Turians, he would spread fear among them and sow the seeds of doubt. If he didn't, and this was more likely, he'd make the other prisoners more docile when they'd all been captured with his stories of what he had seen. Psychological warfare games were SO MUCH FUN!

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:40 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

Saren, Nihlus, and their driver, one Lantar Sidonis, had finally managed to tip the APC over, fix up the damage, and get the battered vehicle moving again.

"So, Spectres, where are we going?" Sidonis asked over his shoulder as they bounced along the side of the charred and battered road, littered with pieces of cooked meat and metal. The APC's suspension system seemed to have taken some damage, as every time they rolled something (never something still alive) under their tracks the vehicle would jounce up and then settle back down after several bounces. That generally meant one hell of a pain in the ass, even with armour on, for the Spectres and the hapless driver, considering the amount of debris cluttering the highway and spreading out past the road's edges. The moist soil, from the previous nights' rains, helped somewhat, but it wasn't quite enough.

"We're going to keep moving east until we start finding intact Turian Army units, regroup, and try to negotiate for a favourable surrender for the troops. It is probably in the best interest of the Hierarchy for us all to live on rather than die senselessly without ever even harming the enemy." Saren said, causing the three to all forcibly test their crash harnesses when the driver tried to literally bolt upright with his foot still on the brake.

"Ow, that actually hurt…" Nihlus was rubbing his forehead where it had rather forcibly collided with a piece of equipment that had come loose in the damaged vehicle.

"Sorry, Spectres, I guess what you said made sense, I was just surprised, after all…" Sidonis trailed off.

"I know, you wouldn't expect a Spectre to suggest such a thing, but here we are… WHAT IN THE GODS' NAMES ARE THOSE?" Saren suddenly yelled from outside his roof hatch, causing Sidonis to twitch again, though without the abrupt and painful braking of the last shock. "Sidonis, get under cover of the trees over there!" He yelled down through the hatch, pointing at something over his shoulder.

_Five minutes later…_

Three enormous flying saucers, each 500 meters across, moved across the sky to their east. (A/N: They upsized the CZARs a bit after the Seraphim War.) The saucers blotted out the sun and tore apart clouds with their passage, not to mention pried apart the mandibles of the Turians with shock and awe. They moved past the forest without incident, and were followed by a flock of the fearsome mini-frigates the Turians had faced on more than one occasion. The mini-frigates entered the saucers, which slowly spun, in flights, apparently, the saucers were carriers…

"Spectres, is it just me, or did we just see a huge floating carrier?" Sidonis asked once his mandibles had closed up, the three and their APC were still sitting under cover of trees, and weren't going to move anytime really soon.

"Call us Saren and Nihlus, Sidonis." Saren said. "And by the way, it was just you, because we saw three huge, floating carriers."

It was now Nihlus' turn to facepalm, and to take a friendly jab at his friend "Saren, that's hardly the point. The fleet would have detected something like that, even from orbit, when we came in. We only saw two major energy signatures when we were inbound to the planet, and they were near the Space Elevator. Those three could not have been attributed to those two signatures unless they were sitting there stacked on top of one another at the time. We all know that the Mass Effect fields required for such immense things to hover would interact and cause unpredictable issues. That means they'd probably all come crashing back to the ground if they were stacked."

A rumbling noise came from where the carriers were headed, and so the three Turians looked out through the undergrowth again. Each carrier was emitting a wide, brightly glowing beam from its centre down to the ground. They weren't sure exactly how much damage the wide, impossibly bright beams were doing, but if the thunderous rumbling, and it was LOUD, to be heard at this distance, was any indication…

A collective shudder ran through the unlikely trio, and Nihlus spoke again "What I really want to know, is how the hell those things weren't detected on our sensors, did they hide them underground? Did they assemble them after we arrived? I hope it's the former…"

"Knowing our luck so far on this cursed planet, it'll be the latter." Saren said gravely.

"I'm inclined to agree with Saren, everything we've done so far, other than the asteroid impact, has utterly failed, and even the asteroid impact caused a response that destroyed our fleet and all our large orbital-capable and/or jump-capable ships and craft." Sidonis said.

"When did that happen? We were never informed!" Saren demanded, angry at the stupidity of Operational Command, not informing their two Spectre agents as to what was happening.

"Well, you two were kind of stuck in the city for a while, and you did lose your long-distance comm. Units…" Sidonis shrugged "and I only caught the tail end of the broadcast just now…"

"Well, we've gotten far enough off-topic, HOW THE HELL DID THOSE CARRIERS GET THERE, or rather, here?" Nihlus asked, waving his arms around for emphasis.

"HQ doesn't know, but I've reported the sightings, and I have a feeling we're about to find out…" Sidonis sounded distinctly worried to Saren, and quite frankly, he was nervous too.

"I expect it to be an unpleasant surprise…"

* * *

_Aboard CZAR, East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:47 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

Most predictably, it _was_ an unpleasant surprise. Having chosen to watch the video on the Aeon Illuminate military, Faran Arterius was presented with the most unpleasant surprise of his short life. He watched, wide-eyed as a group of those three-lobed Aeon engineers, T3 engineers, as he'd learned, focus their beams on a swirling vortex of energy and matter from which a gigantic flying saucer slowly came into existence. Within a couple minutes, the CZAR was completed and quickly rose into the air, holding position at an altitude equal to twice its own diameter. With the rise of the CZAR, his stomach sank further, though it was a mystery how it had yet to sink through his feet.

The other Aeon Experimentals paraded across the screen slowly, a Galactic Colossus Experimental Assault Bot marching through dozens of titan Siege Assault Bots, shrugging off fire… A Tempest-class Experimental Battleship shelling shore defences and building new ships in its docking space… The rest was censored. He was not inclined to pry, he had read enough. To survive this war, the Relay 282 incident, the Turian Hierarchy would need to immediately concede defeat and pay reparations. If not, then this would set the stage for a repeat of the humans' Infinite War, but with an absurdly huge technological disparity, especially on the ground. The Hierarchy was effectively doomed to failure against this new enemy, unless overwhelming amounts of asteroid warfare were employed.

* * *

Williams kept smashing Turian units, now using normal units instead of artillery, because artillery wasn't quite accurate enough (shells too slow or spread too large) for the sizes of Turian units she was now dealing with. Instead of Titans, she had chosen to deploy Loyalists against the enemy infantry, as the Electron Bolters of Loyalists had a very high firing rate considering their power.

She had sent transport trucks, Mech Marines and Engineers to each of the walled enclosures in turn, with a Loyalist and an Athanah covering the convoy, and essentially collected all the Turians from each enclosure. She also collected the Turians from her fake suburban buildings, by reclaiming the buildings floor by floor, starting at the top floor. All the Turians were dumped in a prison facility she'd built out of wall blocks, with food synthesizer and water supply included. Curiously, the Turians were a dextro-amino species, all others the Coalition had come across had been levo-amino…

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 7:55 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

"Nihlus, you want to make the transmission?" Saren asked as he gripped the microphone uneasily, glancing over at his friend.

"Nah, you can do it." Nihlus grinned back.

"You're an ass." Saren scowled.

"Hallelujah, tell me something I don't know!" Nihlus threw his arms into the air, still with that annoying smile plastered on his face

"Fine, I'll do it…" Saren grumbled, turning the broadcast on "Soldiers of the Turian Hierarchy! This is Spectres Saren Arterius and Nihlus Kryik. You have fought well these past days, however, our gunships, fighters and vehicles are gone, our support fleet obliterated, we are cornered, with no escape. Our duty now, to the Hierarchy and the Turian people, is to live to fight another day. I call upon you to lay down your weapons, surrender, and survive!" He cut the transmission "Do you think they'll actually listen?"

"Uh, no" Nihlus shrugged. "Can't hurt to try though… Our troops shouldn't die pointlessly."

From within the APC came the noise of Sidonis banging his head against his console "Nihlus, you sounded like a REALLY bad vid…"

"I agree" Saren simply said, as the comms were flooded by messages of surrender to the aliens.

* * *

A/N: Bet you weren't expecting Sidonis as an APC driver eh?

POLL UP: WHEN SHOULD I INTRODUCE JAMES SHEPARD? (John's twin brother)

VOTE NOW ON MY PROFILE!

By the way: The reason why an ACU can start up a base without getting pounded flat by local Salvation or Mavor guns is because: Command Bunkers and Control Nodes cannot normally fire the weapons, only maintain them. Only ACUs or SCUs can build them and/or order firing. ACUs now come standard with a stealth field emitter, so the base is undetectable on radar to start off. Thus, a Commander is still capable of pulling off the attacks we see in-game even against an enemy with T3 or T4 artillery. Also, colonies do not normally maintain such installations, as they are simply too inefficient to maintain in peacetime in anything smaller than a Secondary City.


	6. The Tide Has Turned

A/N: To those who think that I made the Turian Landcruisers far too weak, let's just say that the Mako was hardly very tough (a six-ton ore even 16-ton vehicle of that size is at best an armoured car, not a Tank), and the citadel tends to rely on speed to dodge enemy fire (lets face it, 40m/s or 144 km/s is fast enough to throw a lot of stuff off the mark). Regrettably, the faster Supreme Commander land units are a great deal faster. Medium Armour and other T2 units tend to move around 60 m/s or 216 km/h and Siege Assault Bots/Heavy Armour aka Titans/Loyalists/Harbingers/Othuums tends to move around 80 m/s. Thus SupCom units need better fire control computers to track their targets.

That is why the Turian Landcruisers seem so absurdly weak. Also, to those who complain about how 4 Turian Landcruisers match up to 1 T1 Light Armour unit for the Coalition (other than Aurora Light Hover Tanks)… it took a lot more than 4 Sherman tanks to match up to a Tiger I in World War II… usually the number needed was close to 10-14 Shermans to one Tiger for a good chance of winning. Those tanks were a few years apart in design… The Turian Landcruisers are a few hundred if not a thousand years behind the Coalition designs! So basically the Turians would be instantly doomed if I was realistic.

NOTE: Citadel Technology does not advance very quickly, in the 300 years in canon between the Morning War and ME 1 it didn't change much, this is why they're WAY behind on land and slightly behind in space.

* * *

Chapter 6: The Tide Has Turned

_Capital City, Shanxi, Local Time 9:00 PM, 11 September, 3865_

"Ah, the quantum storm has begun to clear up, transmit a log of all events that transpired over the last two days." Williams ordered from within her ACU, which she'd mounted up in after the Turian fleet had been clobbered.

"Yes, Grand Crusader. Avatar of War Rhiza is on the horn, patching her through now." The comm. Tech informed her, engaging the quantum static compensators and adjusting settings to clear up the signal. The last remnants of the quantum storm were still running interference with the transmission…

"Grand Crusader, the last garbled reports showed a series of jumps into a nearby system. HQ is unsure as to the nature of the ships, as the signal was lost before POSIDENT was achieved. What did you find, Ariel?"

"Avatar of War, the ships were identified as Turian Hierarchy warships, the same faction that attacked our Deep Exploration Fleet that activated Mass Relay 282. They launched an invasion of Shanxi, starting on Continent Two; I ordered standard evacuation procedures and started the long trip of shipping Engineers over to the other continent, a severe oversight on the behalf of the civilian authorities. After destroying a quarter of the invasion force's vehicles in less than a day, the enemy dared deploy asteroid bombardment, though I had shown them much mercy. 35 million civilians were lost in the Northern Secondary city of the continent from the asteroid impact… The enemy fleet was promptly annihilated without mercy, by way of Yolona Oss and a Corvette and Frigate fleet assembled on my side of the planet and launched. At 8:00 AM local time, one hour before now, the Turians surrendered, led by Spectre Agents Saren Arterius and Nihlus Kryik."

"Understood, Grand Crusader, congratulations on the survival rate of your civilians, two of our other border colonies were assaulted via asteroid bombardment in the past five hours, they were total losses, with a total of 75 million colonists lost not including the 35 million from Shanxi. We couldn't get Commanders on-planet through the Quantum Storm, and the local ground-to-orbital defences couldn't deal with the asteroids in time. The Coalition, the entirety of the Coalition, is preparing for war. We can only hope this will not become a war of extermination…" Rhiza paused. "Grand Crusader, we will assign three Crusaders and their battle groups to you, to lead in this campaign into Turian space, the other member states and branches of the Coalition have promised to contribute some of their own military forces. We will send up Support Commanders to hold the captured planets as required. We will continue the briefing once all the commanders have arrived at a jump-off point you designate. Good Luck dealing with the POWs, Rhiza out."

Williams considered the troops she could use once Rhiza cut the channel. That was a good-sized force already, judging by the Turians she'd seen so far, one or two commanders would be enough for each planet, and only two or three hours required per planet, not enough time to employ asteroid warfare. Each Templar would command up to three Knights, Each Crusader could command up to three Templar, and a Grand Crusader could coordinate up to four Crusaders at once. The three battle groups she was assigned would likely have 39 Commanders, if the Coalition government took this Turian War seriously. 40 Commanders from the Aeon Illuminate alone, an impressive force, if the other factions made similar contributions, then the Coalition could probably take down up to 150-160 Turian planets at once. Considering the rarity of dextro-worlds compared to levo-worlds, the Turian hierarchy could not have held THAT many planets, even counting terraformed worlds. The Coalition could probably force the Hierarchy to its knees within a day or so considering their Army's weak nature.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 9:30 AM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

"Hey dad!" Faran waved to Saren as he passed by Faran's tent, with the net result of Saren turning his head at just the right time to walk solidly into a pole. Nihlus laughed his ass off before Saren cuffed him around the head in irritation.

"Faran? What in the gods' names are you doing here?" Saren demanded, angry at his son for letting himself get assigned to this mad mission.

"Well, dad, my gunship wing got assigned to the fleet of the _Dawn Under Heaven_ two days ago, after Uncle Nihlus' first encounter with the Coalition of Species. I landed aboard one of their carriers out of desperation and got myself captured, don't worry, they didn't hurt me. In fact, I didn't even see one Human, Seraphim, or Drell."

"Drell? Aren't they extinct except for the small population on Kahje, the Hanar Homeworld?" Nihlus asked, intrigued. "Didn't their planet suffer complete ecological collapse from their Industrial Revolution?"

"I thought so too, but the room I was in on the flying carrier had a console, and it showed me some… interesting… videos, translated into perfect Turian." Faran grinned. "I learned a lot from the videos…"

"They made you watch porn?" was Nihlus' first comment.

Saren and Faran both facepalmed at the same time "The human commander let me download the videos to my Omni-tool, well, they downloaded it to my Omni-tool, but here, you can watch it again along with me."

"Son, you never denied Nihlus' accusation."

"Okay, fine, UNCLE NIHLUS, THE COALITION OF SPECIES COMMANDER DID NOT MAKE ME WATCH PORN!" The Turian troops passing by turned as one, and then almost all fell over laughing, pointing at Nihlus.

The comments Nihlus got from the troops ranged from "What an idiotic accusation! They're aliens!" to "He's REALLY got blue balls if he's that eager for aliens!" to far more outrageous claims that went ignored. (A/N: And will not be said here because I don't feel like upping the rating of the fic for language of all things)

"Well, now that you've been made an idiot of, let's watch the vid." Faran said smugly once the laughter had died down, his smile completely died the moment he called up the vid. "Uncle, Father, you should both sit down." He said as he selected "Play History Documentary" from the menu of the vid.

The three Turians bore witness to the dawn of Humanity's Quantum Age, astounded, or in Faran's case, once again astounded by the rise of the Quantum Gate Network. They followed the vid as the Cybran Nation was born, with Doctor Gustav Brackman's first twining of an AI and a human brain. They watched as the Seraphim in the Galaxy were exterminated by xenophobic soldiers of the Earth Empire. The documentary covered the collapse of the Empire, after 500 years of endless war between the three sides, and the rise of the United Earth Federation. It also covered the discovery of the Drell and the pact made with the Cybrans, who saved their world. Then it shifted to the end of the Infinite War, with a Cybran victory, which signalled the start of the Seraphim War.

Thousands of worlds burnt to ashes, hundreds of billions of humans dead… _how could any species recover so quickly?_ Thought Saren… It had only been eighteen years since the end of the Seraphim War… The Coalition of Species formed out of the Coalition for the mutual Defence and Security of Humanity, established by the Cybran Nation and UEF less than a year into the Seraphim War. The Aeon had joined, and the organization was renamed to simply the Coalition once the Seraphim Separatists signed up. The United Nations of Drell, essentially a protectorate of the Cybrans, had helped with providing bases of operations for the Coalition during the war, so after the Seraphim War was over, they became one of the founding members of the Coalition of Species.

The Seraphim Separatists had played a critical role in sealing the Quantum Rift that allowed the Seraphim to invade the Galaxy. They were also critical in reversing the ecological damage to Earth, homeworld of humanity and the other planets once held by the Seraphim Loyalists and Order. Their knowledge of how their weapons worked allowed them to quickly fix damage it would have taken years to undo. The seeds of new plants were sown, and several years later animals were slowly re-introduced, and by now, Earth and the formerly barren systems were once again vibrant with life…

By the time the video was finished, Saren felt compelled to ask Nihlus to clean the front of his armour, such was the amount of drool that had fallen there with the Turian's mandibles open so far. Then he wiped his own mouth and said "Well, this changes things…"

"Dad, wait a moment before making any conclusions, there's better stuff, look at these military videos!"

"How the hell did these aliens, I mean, humans, allow you to get your hands on such sensitive information?" Nihlus asked incredulously "And why did that human look like a pink Asari with fur on her head?"

"I was trapped in a room on a CZAR-class flying fortress, one of the big floating carriers you may or may not have seen…" Faran trailed off, looking between his father and Nihlus inquisitively.

"We've seen them, son, go on."

"My gunship was being trailed by enough missiles to vaporize it, so I dove into the landing bay of a CZAR in desperation. For some reason I was allowed to go to a particular room once I entered the circular hallway in the carrier, then I was locked in. A console on the wall displayed a short transmission from the human commander, Grand Crusader Ariel Williams, on this planet, and then she told me to look over some of the data on the Coalition to see if it would help me decide what I should do. After I watched all the videos, I downloaded this information." Faran explained. "Now I have all this information on my Omni-tool, and I can transfer it to anyone here."

"I think you should just give everyone the information, that way this has the greatest chance of reaching the Hierarchy, but keep it at Spectre-level encryption, we can't afford letting panic spread through the ranks at the information." Nihlus said, to which Saren nodded.

"Son, you've done well, not giving this information out to everyone, now, while you're copying the data to our Omni-tools to distribute to everyone, why don't we watch the next couple documentaries on the military of this Coalition?"

* * *

_Capital City, Shanxi, Local Time, 11:50 PM, 11 September, 3865_

_T-10M_

Williams was quite happy at how things turned out. The UEF had sent Hackett with another 39 Commanders of various ranks. Seth-Thauum had arrived from the Seraphim Republic with a squadron of 9 other commanders. The Seraphim Republic was still recovering from the Seraphim War and the horrific losses they had taken from the Loyalists, so it couldn't send more. The Cybran Contingent included Shepard with her 39 Commanders.

In terms of ranks, each Knight was equal to a Lieutenant (UEF) or Commander (Cybran). Each Templar was equal to a Captain (UEF) or Squad Commander (Cybran). Each Crusader was the equivalent of a UEF Major or Cybran Force Commander. A Grand Crusader was the equivalent of a Colonel or Division Commander. Lord Crusaders, a rarely appointed rank, were essentially Generals or Army Commanders in the field. The Avatar of War was the equivalent of Supreme UEF Commander or Elite Commander in rank.

Seth had three Templar (The Seraphim Republic decided the Aeon naming system was closest to theirs and adopted it) each with two Knights. Hackett and Shepard commanded the same groups she did, 3 Crusaders (or equivalent) each with 3 Templar each with 3 Knights. This mission, with the 130 Commanders, would most likely be a cakewalk.

The Elite Four were together again, and it was well known that together, they were unbeatable. The four factions' commanders stood in neat rows before the Cybran Quantum Gateways that would be the jumping board for the invasion into Turian space. They had stripped the information from the hulks of the Turian ships and from the Turians' wrist computers, sent stealthed probes to confirm the existence of the Turian colonies, and to check for orbital warships. The Commanders would gate to the lightest defended worlds once the Frigate groups had eliminated the orbital defences and settled into orbit. Thus, they would draw defenders away from the more heavily defended worlds, which would be stripped of orbital warships by Hunter Squadrons of heavier ships. Then, more Commanders would gate in and secure the worlds. They would leave enough Control Nodes for the SCU pilots gating in to secure the planet, as well as assembling Quantum Gates so they could jump off to the next set of planets. Several dozen Orbital Gates had already been set up (and stealthed) in remote systems without habitable worlds. They would allow the Commanders to take down 100 of the Turian Hierarchy's worlds in one fell swoop. According to the maps the hulks had provided, there were a grand total of a little over 1000 worlds in the Hierarchy, which bordered something called "Council Space" all over the place, as if every dextro-world belonged to the Turians, while the levo-worlds belonged to the Council.

Looking over the Coalition forces once more, General Hackett began to speak. "Hear me, Commanders of the Coalition of Species! Our territory has been invaded, our lands desecrated, our civilians slaughtered by those we now know as the Turian Hierarchy. We will strike back and avenge the 110 million humans, Seraphim and Drell that died in the last 24 hours!" Commanders of all three species were present…

Seth continued the speech "We will strike back at the enemy, secure his worlds, and use them as stepping stones to attack the next set of worlds, handing the holding duty to our SCU pilots! Remember, Commanders, though we may feel fury, though we may feel hate against these Turians, we are better than them! We will not harm the innocent! We will not cut down unarmed civilians!"

Shepard took up the speech "Instead, we shall strike at the enemy, cutting off limb by limb of their Hierarchy, until in the end it becomes clear to them and to all the races of the Galaxy that The Tide Has Turned!" She lifted her ACU's weapon arm into the air in emphasis "We have overcome the hurdles of the Infinite War, of the Seraphim War, and now, we shall walk all over this Turian War as it is NOTHING compared to what we have faced, and have overcome, as one entity, with our UNITY!."

Williams continued the speech from there "Today, Commanders, we enter these Gates, Tomorrow, Commanders, We will return victorious, the Turian Hierarchy smashed beyond all hope of repair. Though this is not a war of extermination, feel free to order your units to return fire, for they who dare to rouse the wrath of the Coalition shall suffer the wrath of the Coalition!"

She fired off a shot of her Quantum Disruptor upward into the sky. A storm of Molecular Ripper Cannon (Cybran ACU), Zephyr Anti-Matter Cannon (UEF ACU), Chronotron Cannon (Seraphim ACU) and more Quantum Disruptor fire soared into the night sky. Their destructive energies made for a brilliant fireworks show, watched by trillions of Humans, Seraphim and Drell across many thousands of planets in the Coalition of Species.

"At midnight, Commanders, WE GATE! ASSUME YOUR POSITIONS!" Shepard, Williams, Hackett and Seth announced simultaneously, Williams still dryly musing over why the Turians would in their desperation choose using asteroid warfare against an obviously technologically superior race over negotiations…

* * *

_Unknown System, Galactic North of Shanxi, and of UEF Space._

_T-5M_

"Well, we made it." The pilot turned around. "A patrol fleet is on its way and will pick us up in fifteen minutes, I hope you have the report ready, Captain, or we'd have left the others to die for nothing."

"Don't worry, I have the ground combat footage, it must get to HQ quickly, these Aliens are too dangerous, we should try to find the rest of their worlds. They probably don't have many colonies other than their homeworld, considering the broken-up nature of the Mass Relay Network in that whole third of the Galaxy, and snip the threat in the bud."

Unbeknownst to him, the fifteen minutes of waiting would rob the Turian Hierarchy of any hope of even holding on to any of the 100 worlds designated for the first great strike by the Coalition. Indeed, every minute that slipped by while the Captain and his shuttlecraft pilot sat there waiting in the quiet vastness of space would prove to have major consequences down the road.

* * *

_Capital City, Shanxi, Local Time, 12:00 AM, 12 September, 3865_

_Zero Hour_

With sixty bright flashes of light, the first sixty commanders gated onto sixty different, lightly defended Turian colony worlds, the Turians didn't even notice, due to the stealth fields of the ACUs. The 60 Commanders built up vast armies within forty minutes under the cover of stealth and advanced on the Turians. The first sign the Turians got of something being wrong was a series of blips on radar. Waves of fifty Brick Armoured Assault Bots supported by Athanahs, Ascendants and a pair of Fatboys each advanced from three or four directions on each Capital city of the Turian colonies. Every other major spaceport in the colonies was put out of commission by the abrupt landing of dozens of Armoured Assault Bots, Shield Generators, Bangers (Cybran T2 Mobile Flak) and T3 Combat Engineers, then the deployment of wall sections and Network Nodes, then large amounts of defences. There was a lot of resistance, which was what the Mech Marines that had been brought along were for (The Armoured Assault Bots were used to take down large-scale organized resistance, their weapons were simply too powerful).

The Turians had brought out their vehicular SAM batteries to attempt to counter the transports, but the Gauss Cannons of the transports shredded them. Turian Fighters were utterly cut apart by the Flayer SAM Launchers on the transports; even before the Brick AAB squads landed and started laying out their own flak and Heavy Disintegrator Pulse Laser fire.

It took a mere hour before the 60 Colonies were securely in Coalition hands, their populations more or less left alone expect for the blockade of the Spaceports. This was in no small part due to the absence of orbiting Turian warships. Using Deceivers, Continentals could now fly outside the atmosphere safely (they could not before because their mass made them fairly visible to gravimetric sensors), making a halfway around the world trip take only half an hour. The entire strike was conducted simultaneously across all sixty planets, in no small part thanks to the coordination skills of the Elite Four.

The moment the first wave of distress calls was sent out, at 12:40 AM Shanxi Capital Time, the fleets of the five most heavily defended worlds began to move to assist those worlds, and so did the next batch of 35 commanders. Frigate groups cleared out Orbital resistance over the next 35, moderately defended, planets and provided Air and Orbital Superiority while the commanders built up the bases needed to take over the planet.

By 1:05 AM Shanxi Capital Time, the five Turian fleets of the sector had reached the Mass Relays of their respective systems, using their FTL drives to speed things up, even though they would have to discharge the cores later. This was when the fourth group, of 35 Commanders, including the Elite Four, gated to said heavily defended planets.

One of the wonders of Orbital Defences was that the guns all faced AWAY from the planet, so when the Hunter Clutches gated in within the geosynchronous orbits of the Turian Orbital Defences over the five worlds… Said Orbital Defences were caught with their pants down. Volleys of Loa Tactical Missiles, Ravager Plasma Chainguns, Oblivion Cannons, Sonance Artillery Shells, Proton Cannons, and Plasma beams smashed the stations down one by one. The Turian fleets in the sector finally realized what had happened, AFTER they were almost at their destinations and had started taking Mavor fire from the groundside batteries that had sprung up (supported by a Paragon or in some cases two). They began to turn back at 1:15 AM Shanxi Capital Time, having lost some of their number from Geminis and Restorers in addition to the Mavors, but they would not get there in time. It had been a 35-minute trip there; it would be a 35-minute trip back. The total of 45 minutes was more than enough time for the Coalition commanders to channel their resources together (by networking their resource feeds) on each planet to put up one Paragon per planet, then another, then another, and then put up a crapload of Mavors.

At Zero Hour plus Two, all 100 planets were firmly under Coalition control. Each planet's planetary network of defences was handed over to Support Commanders just gating in to the planets. Each Support Commander could have up to 3000 units using Network Nodes, another reason most preferred ACUs if given the choice, with Node support, ACUs could pull up to 5000 units at once.

200 Support Commanders were placed on the planets, commanders of various Coalition factions. They would be responsible for holding the fort. The best thing about this region of space was the stability of the quantum fabric of space in this area, there was no risk of quantum storms and thus local gates could be used to rush units from one side of the planet to another easily.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 4:00 PM Groundside Time, 11 September, 3865_

_T plus 4H_

Saren's current impression of this war was not anywhere near the easy victory he'd had at the beginning of the conflict, two and a half days ago, The Coalition of Species had patched through combat footage and a galactic map to the Turian prisoners in the dozen or so semi-separated compounds. They were enclosed but had 20-meter wall gaps that the Turians could travel between sections through. The survivors of the Army force were currently too busy to do any walking around, however, they were busy gaping at the immense holograms that depicted the battles or rather, walkovers that "raged" all over Turian Space.

The Hierarchy had already lost a hundred and forty colonies to the Coalition with very little collateral damage, for which the Turian POWs were relieved. But still, a HUNDRED AND FORTY IN FOUR HOURS? The first wave's two hours took out a full hundred colonies, and then the next wave of advance took out forty more using more densely packed landing points. The engineers that were captured, along with hose very interested in the sciences, were chattering away quietly about the implications of the Quantum Gate technology the Coalition of Species had.

"It does seem ridiculous, right dad?" Faran Arterius nudged his father. "I mean, why we ever even contemplated just attacking this faction instead of negotiating with them..."

"Faran, you weren't there when we first ran into them. They were physically docking with and visibly rewiring an unknown Primary Mass Relay, that's why Admiral Valern ordered the fleet to open fire. I was on the bridge with him, I could understand his reasoning. However I could never understand why he still went ahead and recommended war upon this enemy, though they may be manipulating the relays, instead of peaceful negotiation." Nihlus scratched his fringe absently, still looking at the combat footage. "And now, he's pretty much doomed the Hierarchy, I don't think the Coalition will want to let the Hierarchy keep its military after we used asteroid warfare against several of their planets, Valern being the idiot he was wanting to make them surrender by bombarding what we thought were primary worlds." He snorted "Of only we'd known of the size of the Coalition then!"

Indeed, on the Galactic Maps they'd been looking at, Coalition Space in total matched up to the Space held by the Turian Hierarchy, or the Asari Republics, or the Salarians. Even though the controlled roughly the same amount of space as any one of the three major players in Council Space, their colony density was far, far, FAR higher. "Even if we had known of the size of the space held by the Coalition, we would still have expected the combined might of the Council Races to crush them, and this war would have gotten even bigger, and they would likely have still won!" Saren said in response "We didn't know about their mass-energy transformation techniques and the speed at which they could terraform planets, turning an uninhabitable world into a paradise within a hundred years, and turning hostile worlds into paradise in as little as three years depending on the reason of hostility. Their settled worlds are similar in number to all the colonies held by the rest of the known races in the galaxy!" However, the Human and Seraphim populations were still recovering from the Seraphim War, and the Drell Population had always limited its own growth after the near-destruction of their world. So population-wise, the Humans were slightly smaller than any of the three major players in Council Space. After all, Trillions of humans across hundreds of planets had burned in that war, and it would take some time for the human population to recover from the damage of over a quarter of their species dying.

* * *

_Citadel Station, Serpent Nebula, 12 September, 3865._

_T plus 12H_

"Councillors! There is urgent news!" a panicked Turian comm. tech barged into the Council Chambers without being announced.

Councillor Velarn was mildly irritated to be so rudely interrupted. "Yes, what is it?"

"A Hierarchy Recon Group just picked up a shuttlecraft registered to one of the warships that departed three days ago to investigate the new alien faction. The Captain has been delivered to the station and has urgent information that must be brought before the council… Admiral Velarn ordered it." The tech paused to breathe "Five of the Hierarchy Fleet Posts in the sector bordering the aliens have also gone silent and are currently broadcasting distress signals steadily. In the signals are the logs of receiving distress signals from nearly a hundred other Turian colony worlds shortly before they themselves started broadcasting."

"It must have been a very well-coordinated offensive then." Councillor Armin observed. "And what have the Recon groups told us about this?"

"The 'Coalition of Species' as they call themselves appear to have achieved near-total aerospace superiority and set up significant anti-orbital weapons on all one hundred worlds." The tech had called up the hologram of a Recon Group Commander, a Captain, to make his report. "We have been unable to close distance without taking debilitating fire from ground batteries or in some cases orbiting cruisers and frigates. The Cruiser Captain we picked up is now on the Citadel and making his way to the Council Chambers to present new and horrifying evidence of these aliens…" The Captain trailed off as the door to the Council Chambers opened.

"Noble Councillors, I have new and disturbing information regarding the capabilities of our new foe. Here are the ground combat logs recorded by our Landcruisers and gunships…" Gasps and hisses of fury were heard as the video showed hundreds of glowing bolts streaking across the battlefield and blowing rapidly evading Landcruisers apart left, right and centre. The pounding of artillery shells and their horrific effects on Landcruiser armour came up, and then came the dying of the gunships, droves falling from the skies… before the holo switched to the demise of the _Dawn Under Heaven_ in a single blinding flash of light. Finally the recording concluded with a view of the final stand by the Turian Expeditionary Fleet, the cruisers and frigates being torn to scrap metal by the superior numbers of alien cruisers and frigates.

"Only one thing proved effective against the shields of the aliens, a Type I Weapon of Mass Destruction." The Captain said, drawing up the recording of the fleet using their combined Mass Effect fields to drive the (very) small moon into the planet. "I recommend that if we are to have any chance of victory, that we immediately seek out the other colonies of this enemy, and there cannot be many, as such as small population appears to count as a primary colony, as evidenced by the Space Elevator. We should immediately bomb them back to the Stone Age, while we still can. They are most likely quite small, so they will not be able to overwhelm us, we have numbers and size on our side."

"Admiral Valern was NOT authorized to use asteroid warfare. I now understand why the aliens destroyed the _Dawn Under Heaven_ in such a fashion. They were trying to tell us to leave and stop bothering them." Councillor Tevos took a breath "Did you notice the first time the Landcruisers retreated? The ground defence guns, though the Landcruisers were still well within their ranges, ceased firing in a show of goodwill. The Field Master squandered it by ordering mass fire to break through the shields…"

The comm. tech from before spoke up in alarm, looking at the newest reports coming in "Councillors, we have reports that a hundred fifty additional Turian colonies, all over the Galaxy, had gone silent over the last ten hours, they suspected it to be a comm.. failure but the distress signals say otherwise. Wait; take that number to a two hundred fifty colonies. Over a third of Turian Space has gone silent!"

"If it is these aliens, I fear for the lives of the Turians on those planets." Tevos shook her head sadly. "Bring the Galactic Map up, we must discuss how best to thwart this enemy's advance."

_One Galactic Map Later…_

The four Councillors stared in mute shock at the galactic map, which formed a pair of well-known rude gestures among Asari (and incidentally, Humans). Two five-fingered (or at least five-knuckled) fists pointed toward Palaven from Galactic east and south once the silent Turian colonies had been highlighted in red, both had their middle fingers stuck out toward the planet.

* * *

_T plus 12 H, Coalition Operational Command_

Now, considering the warning was out, the attacking groups of commanders gated in much more concentrated fashion, gating to 20 planets at a time, sending 6 or 7 commanders to each planet. This way, each commander was only responsible for securing a continent or so, then setting up Control Nodes, which would be transferred over to the SCU pilots that would arrive later to hold the line.

Progress had slowed down somewhat, the 130 Coalition Commanders only taking 20 planets in each two-hour phase of the campaign, but the nature of the campaign had changed. Coordinates of higher-security planets had to be forcibly ripped from the databases in the spaceports of conquered planets. They had already located the Turians' Homeworld, and would soon advance on Palaven, as it was called; they just had to wait until the nearby systems were pacified.

Civilian casualties were non-existent so far for the Turians, however anyone who tried to fight back using firearms or other lethal weapons were either detained or, if they had anything higher than a grenade launcher in power, terminated. The groundside military of the Turians was so far best described as laughable… The 220 Turian worlds that had been captured by the Elite Four's commanders so far represented a good fifth of the Hierarchy's total holdings. At this rate, the Hierarchy would be utterly annihilated within 36 hours of Zero Hour, considering the 130 additional colonies captured by other commander groups tasked with securing the flanks of the advance.

Williams, Hackett, Seth and Shepard smiled as one as the 130 commanders gated again, after the Coalition Fleet had gone ahead to clear out orbital forces. They then continued their casual discussion of the reasoning behind the war as President Hall, Avatar of War Rhiza, Elite commander Dostya, and Prime Minister Ratheen coordinated the other Commanders tasked to attacking other Turian colonies, and assisting the assault force.

* * *

"So, Seth, you're still using an SCU?" Hackett inquired.

"Well, I'm with you guys, so I can afford to use an SCU, with the high resource consumption AND generation and all… but when I'm on my own, I use an ACU like most other commanders. Besides, the SCU's lower compatibility with large numbers of Network Nodes has never been an issue, because I work with ACU pilots whenever I'm using an SCU." Seth shrugged "So, what do you think drove these idiotic Turians to use asteroid warfare?"

"I would guess desperation; they seemed non-hostile at first when one of their fleets, on patrol for unidentified ships, according to the prisoners, approached us. They entered a hostile formation only when the Constructor attached to the Deep Space Exploration fleet docked with a Primary Mass Relay. They only decided to open fire when they witnessed the Constructor repairing the Relay, fearful of what we were doing to such an ancient artefact that could not be even scratched badly by their starship guns. They thought we were altering the Relay in preparation of launching an invasion…" She trailed off, letting Shepard continue.

"Well the Turians decided to strike first, according to one of their people I questioned; they decided to launch an attack against what seemed to them to be a core colony, basing the judgement upon the Space Elevator that was being constructed on Shanxi." Shepard said casually while upgrading her T1 Mass Extractors to T2, then deploying more deceivers and building some T3 Mass Extractors.

"Hmm, makes strategic sense, but their Intel service needed a LOT of work… Although they're not completely off, we only use Space Elevators on worlds with major heavy exports, as gating is just too energy-intensive for efficient bulk shipping. Too bad standard foodstuffs can't be nanolathed. I've always wondered why circuit boards can be nanolathed but not food…" Hackett trailed off as the first of the four's Armoured Assault Bots began walking off the factories, accompanied by Siege Assault Bots and Heavy Armour units.

"Last I checked, it was because food is too complex at too small a scale for nanolathing, while microprocessors are in fact simpler in terms of composition." Shepard answered "the closest things to food that can be nanolathed are nutrient bars and energy bars, and the nanolathed versions taste a great deal worse than shit. Don't ask how I know." She said with a warning tone, remembering the time when a toilet had reversed its flow due to John's tampering, right into her face as she was trying to fix it up. Reclaiming simply didn't work against items as small as a single shitload of, well, shit… so old-fashioned flushing was required to gather enough to reclaim.

"Alright, so back on topic, why do you think they chose to use asteroid warfare even after we proved our overwhelming tech superiority?" Seth said, absent-mindedly coordinating all the other Commanders across several systems as he built Athanahs and Usha-ahs (Heavy Mobile Shields and Sniper Bots)

"I reckon it's because since we obviously weren't that big, from the tiny population warranting a Space Elevator, it must have been a core colony, so we couldn't have spread out very much if a Core Colony remained so small." Shepard answered as she began the assault on the major Spaceports simultaneously. Her Revenant Bombers dropped one bomb on each smaller spaceport's landing areas, as was standard procedure throughout this blitzkrieg that was the Coalition's counterattack.

"Makes sense, but wow did their Intel doom them." Hackett said after a moment of silence.

After another long silence, Shepard started talking "So, Ariel, how's the kids? Why didn't you let Ashley come over to play anymore after she turned five?"

"I thought we went over this already, she was worse at raising hell than her dad was when he was young, and it started after she and your twins teamed up… Didn't I explain this to you back then, and you agreed?"

"Meh… just felt like talking about something… So how are Abby, Lynn and Sarah all doing?" The two women HAD stayed friends even after they had to drag their kids apart to maintain their own sanity…

"Uh, Shepard, Williams, can you guys use a private channel? I remember the last time we had this sort of conversation, and it was why I still don't want any kids, yes, Shepard, I remember the toilet backfiring incident. You guys talked about it on the squad channel instead of the private one while we were clearing out that Seven Hand hideout in the Quarantine Zone." The Quarantine Zone was so named because it was initially the area where the Earth Empire had first established quarantine against the Aeon Illuminate once the Empire was kicked off Seraphim II. Essentially, it meant a large ring-shaped area of space around Seraphim II and some of the neighbouring planets, all core worlds of the Aeon.

"What toilet backfiring incident?" Seth was now curious; he'd been too busy personally squashing the Seven Hand Node members under the feet of a Galactic Colossus (Using Direct Control) to notice much else, trusting his comrades to cover him.

"Seth, you heard nothing, you saw nothing, understood? You will not mention this to anyone, GOT THAT?" Shepard glared, making Seth, for some odd reason feel like a Mole-class Land Scout under the scrutiny of a Galactic Colossus.

"Yes, yes" he said, fear in his voice, before cutting the channel. Hackett and Williams laughed at Shepard's expense while they each continued directing their forces across the planet.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 1:55 AM Groundside Time, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 13:55_

"Well, I think that a third of Hierarchy Space has probably been taken by now, what do you think?" That was Saren's comment after the two Spectres had woken up from their afternoon naps. They were lying on the uncomfortable ground in one of the cells, as the other prisoners called the semi-separated enclosures, designated for sleeping. Those who did not sleep were to remain in the activity cells, where the holoprojectors, showing essentially the downfall of the Hierarchy, were situated.

"I agree, come on, let's check out the newest developments, just to be sure, and grab a bite to eat." The few Turians brave enough to try the surprisingly dextro-amino food the synthesizers put out had promptly thrown up at the horrid taste of pure amino acids, fats, sugars, fibre, vitamins and minerals. After that, the POWs stayed clear of the synthesizers and ate their own rations instead. Surprisingly, mere moments after the incident, a section of wall was dissolved in a flash of light and a new enclosure, filled with rows upon rows of food crates filled with Turian Army Rations, had been exposed, though there were very specific instructions not to attempt escape unless they wanted to be shot. Seeing one of the smallest enemy units, a Mech Marine, as the documentaries called it, tear apart a burnt-out Landcruiser hulk in under a second of shots pounded the point home for the Turians, no one tried to escape, besides, since they weren't being harmed, there would be no reason to keep them alive if the enemy was going to just kill them later.

Saren got up and began to walk toward an activity cell "Alright, but I do hope it doesn't rain, or we'll be in some major trouble with diseases…"

"No worries Saren… look up!" There was a shield that would block out any rain. "And note the drainage systems on the bottoms of those wall blocks!" Indeed, there was drainage…

"I just hope that the Hierarchy survives this whole mess… and the Council too…" Saren said morosely as they trudged along under the Coalition's mighty shield, another symbol of their power, even if unintentional.

"True, but let's hope these humans and Seraphim are not too pissed, which they don't seem to be, considering they've done their utmost to not kill civilians, not like what that idiot Valern did…" Nihlus scowled deeply. "I believe they will be satisfied with wringing peace from the Hierarchy, and will not randomly slaughter our citizens without thought, unlike that bastard Valern…"

It didn't take long to reach the galactic map, along with its readouts "four hundred worlds gone, Palaven surrounded, not as bad as I'd expected…" Saren said, stroking his mandibles in thought.

"What did you expect?" Nihlus asked. "Did you expect the whole of the Hierarchy to be defeated?"

"I expected Palaven would have been burnt to a crisp for what we did to them, but obviously they have far more honour than Valern ever did." Saren said gravely, looking at the galactic map as several of the worlds taken by the Coalition twinkled, signalling conflict in the areas. Some of the twinkling settled down quickly and some continued on for longer as Coalition fleet icons moved to pacify the twinkling. Much to the dismay of the Turians, none of the conflicts resolved in the favour of the Turians.

Though a Council Cruiser and a Coalition Frigate, of similar size, could more or less balance each other, and the same was true with the Council Frigates and Coalition Frigates, the sheer speed with which the Coalition Warships could be fabricated meant that the craft could be easily deployed in overwhelming numbers to beat back a Turian Fleet. This was not to mention the facts that CZARs, Soul Rippers, and Ahwassas were Space Capable, though relatively slow and sluggish, they are still VERY effective weapons platforms if the commander was desperate enough. This was a tried and proven point, though most commanders preferred fabricating Frigates and/or Corvettes, which were much faster and could actually dodge effectively.

Suddenly, at the precise moment when their clock struck 2:00, Commanders began disappearing from the new wave of acquisitions, the commander count for each planet decreasing to one (one SCU to hold the lines at each planet). The system Palaven could be found in suddenly began to flash, the commander counter next to it rising to 90 from zero within seconds. Ten surrounding systems also came under attack by four commanders each.

"We have a problem," was Nihlus' professional opinion, the rest of the Turian POWs concurred. "The Turian Hierarchy has a major problem." It seemed the war might become an easy victory after all… for the Coalition of Species.

* * *

A/N: GO TO MY PROFILE AND VOTE ON THE SUBJECT OF JAMES SHEPARD!

ALSO, REVIEW PLEASE!


	7. Götterdämmerung

A/N: Thank you, all reviewers, you made me write faster.

Before we start, the title of this chapter is, like every chapter up to here, a reference to Hearts of Iron III (Grand Strategy, PC) Standard Start Times for the game. Götterdämmerung is the last of the seven start times (don't worry I'm not even close to done this fic series yet, so expect other references for chapter titles later), it is June 6 or 7, 1944, I do believe. Right after the allies land on the beaches of Normandy.

DEFINITION: Götterdämmerung: Twilight of the Gods.

This a reference to how the Turians had mass effect spaceflight early enough that they could have been seen as Gods by the humans then, but they were so slow about advancing that they are now behind. 50,000 years ago our greatest superweapon was fire against cave bears, theirs was steam-powered tanks. In fact, all of the Citadel Races are in a bit of a twilight moment in terms of technological progress, and besides, the Reaper threat is looming ever nearer, casting twilight on the Galaxy.

Also, regarding many reviewers' questions about Quarians… *drum roll*… you'll see when we get there, but suffice it to say that the Coalition is not going to be very happy at the Council…

So without further ado, I present the last chapter of the Turian War proper, detailing the Siege of Palaven…

* * *

Chapter 7: Götterdämmerung

_2:00 PM Shanxi Capital Time, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 13:59:55_

"Gating sequence initiated." The computer spoke, seconds before the assault would begin. The 40 Commanders who had been chosen to further secure the flanks of the assault force, attacking neighbouring systems also in the enclosure formed by the two Coalition assault forces meeting up, had already gated. The 90 remaining Commanders in the Elite Four's combined strike force gated as one onto the planet known only as Palaven, Homeworld of the Turian species.

The stealthed recon probes gated into the system earlier had detected an Earth-like planet with a much weaker magnetic field, allowing constant low-level high-energy radiation to penetrate to the surface. This would pose no problem for the assault force considering that their vehicles could handle everything from the low temperatures on the surface of an Oort cloud comet (or Pluto, Eris, etc.) to the constant fog-like micro particulate dust clouds covering Vya-3 to the fiery hell of young planets such as the one The Scar was on. The Scar was a place legendary for its mineral deposits and its border position on the joining area of the UEF, Cybran Nation and Aeon Illuminate, thus the place of countless back-and-forth battles of the Infinite War, despite being an island surrounded by lava. The planet had oceans already formed, but much of the planet remained active volcanically, and was uninhabitable at this point in time.

With ninety simultaneous flashes, the nine main continents of Palaven, four in the Northern Hemisphere and five in the Southern Hemisphere, each a colossal island, became home to ninety Commanders of the Coalition. Flashes in orbit signalled the arrival of Hunter Squadrons of the Coalition fleet and the beginning of an orbital stand-off, neither fleet daring to turn its attention, guns and, in the case of the Turians' few dreadnoughts present, ships toward the ground for fear of being caught off-guard by the enemy.

Further reinforcement fleets from the Coalition were en route, but they would be more than two hours away, not in time to assist in any major fashion with the battle. On the Turian side, reinforcement fleets would be able to reach the battle within the hour, so the Turians at the moment were still reasonably confident of victory.

Regrettably, at least for the Turians, the Citadel Council were still just deciding how much information to disclose to the Turian Hierarchy about their enemy, not realizing exactly how fast said enemy could move in base construction. The fools still thought, since no video footage was released from the silenced colonies before communications were cut, that stealthed warship fleets must have landed the vast armies, then shipped them from planet to planet, leaving other fleet elements to set up pre-fabricated ground to orbital batteries. They did not realize that all that was needed to conquer a planet, was one, single, Coalition pilot, in one, single ACU.

* * *

_Palaven, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 14:30 _

"Why don't the idiots just surrender?" Hannah Shepard asked as yet another column of Turian tanks were shredded by her (amphibious) hunter-killer packs of ten Titans, an Athanah and four Ascendants each. "I mean, it's kind of strikingly obvious there's no hope for them…"

"I think it's a matter of principle now that we're the barbarians at the gates. They've developed extremely slowly so far, so they aren't that prone to change and simply surrendering, I'd think." That was Ariel Williams' response.

"I think they're gifts from God, providing us with some target practice after years of more-or-less peace." Hackett said absent-mindedly as he personally controlled a Titan Siege Assault Bot, gleefully walking all over the enemy, literally.

"My personal opinion is that their Intel service has yet to get the message of our full power to them, so they, the Turian Hierarchs, don't understand that they are doomed." Seth said in the raspy voice typical of Seraphim, while the commanders all over the continent were pooling their massive influx of, well, mass from their T3 Mass Extractors to put up a Paragon. This was in preparation for putting up Mavors, for orbital defence, which would become necessary as the Turian Fleet reinforcements, estimated to be only half an hour away, arrived and the Coalition Fleet's limited presence in the area became no longer sufficient. Besides, the mass assembly of Frigates and Corvettes that Paragons could support would help even out the fleet ratios somewhat.

"Yeah, true," Shepard switched to a private channel with Williams "so Ariel has your husband gotten a promotion yet?" Shepard asked in boredom as they kept steamrollering the Turian Army with massed Loyalists, Titans, Bricks, Restorers, Revenants, etc. while also utterly raping the Turian Air Force. Massed Ascendants (because they hover, and the landscape of Palaven had rather large numbers of rivers), Bricks (the new flak guns on top were very nice), Geminis, and of course the Restorer AA Gunships.

No commander had been in any risk of being overwhelmed, having used T1 units to hold off the Turian Army, where applicable (The Turians just weren't fast enough to respond within 15 minutes most of the time), and going to T2, then T3 quickly. Every commander followed roughly the same procedure, supplementing their defences with a few T3 land units before teching up their Mass Extractors from T2 to T3, one or two T2 Power Plants, supplemented by T1 Power Plants and Hydrocarbon Power Plants, provided the required power in the interim. Once the T3 Economy was achieved, mass production of T3 armies had begun, then been stopped in favour of pooling resources for the purpose of putting up a Paragon.

"No, apparently his performance and my clout as a Grand Crusader, and a member of the Elite Four isn't enough to get the idiots that handle promotions in the Coalition Fleet to see past his ancestry, so what if his father was Avatar of War Jaran Marxon? He isn't his father! In the Aeon Illuminate, we even take our mothers' last names!"

"Don't worry, Ariel, my sons faced discrimination because their father was Aeon. People will get over it, and the moment we ask Hackett he'd gladly use his rank as General to promote your husband to the rank he deserves, at least a Lieutenant or Commander…"

"That's just the thing; Eric just refuses to let himself be pulled up by Hackett, he still thinks that honest performance will get him the attention he deserves someday… I'll get him to come around eventually, just hope it doesn't affect Ashley when it comes time for her to start getting promoted." Ashley was a year older than Shepard's twin boys and had already enlisted, and was currently in university to bring her knowledge up to the standard for a position in the Coalition Fleet.

"Well if it does, it's nice to have friends in high places, eh? Like our Hackett, Seth, and of course our old friends Dostya and Rhiza." Shepard winked. "By the way, Dostya and Rhiza sent us a message just now, they say that after we finish this we should check our ACU's personal quarters, especially the cupboard." Each ACU had a small suite in the head section, containing a bed, toilet, shower, and miniature kitchen. "They say we'll find the same things there as I found in my cupboard after I fired Black Sun."

"And what was that?" Williams had immediately started a second Paragon once the first was completed, and commanders all over the continent followed suit. Then the eleven Paragons on the capital continent began to route energy and mass to the other continents, aiding the others in their own Paragon construction programs.

"A nice bottle of high-quality vodka, my God that was some good stuff she left me…" Shepard grinned, while queuing up several dozen Engineers on repeating orders to construct Frigates and Corvettes, sending several dozen others to construct Megaliths, Fatboys, Galactic Colossi, and Monkeylords. A third group started work on CZARs, Ahwassas and Soul Rippers, a fourth, a fleet of Atlantis Carriers and Tempest Battleships, supplementing the already impressive fleet of Uashavoh Destroyers and Yathsou Sub Hunters, making an entirely submersible navy. She only sent one engineer to each experimental unit, besides the Mavors, of course, so the Turians would have about twenty minutes before the Experimentals began knocking on the walls of the Primary Cities. In the case of the Elite Four, the Capital City (the other six commanders would deal with the other Primary City on the continent, with ludicrous ease, while constructing their own farms of Mavors for anti-orbital duties)

By T plus 14:45, each commander on-planet had two Paragons on-line, except the Elite Four, who shared a total of Four Paragons. Everyone also had an extensive backup economy of T3 Power Plants and Mass Extractors (surrounded by Mass Storages to increase efficiency). The endgame was nigh.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 2:15 AM Groundside Time, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 14:15_

"I don't understand why the Hierarchs are doing this, this… futile resistance." Saren said in disgust as he watched army after army be chewed up by the invaders. "Their duty now to the Hierarchy is to save as much of our population as possible. Since the Coalition hasn't tried to slaughter innocents yet, unlike a certain now-deceased Admiral… when they have had ample firepower, ability and time to do so, they won't try to eradicate us. So why throw lives away uselessly?"

"Transmission Detected from Serpent Nebula to Palaven. Data Packets intercepted. Displaying now on secondary screen…" a robotic female voice said, and another hologram popped up next to the first, though much smaller. It displayed combat footage from the first night of actual combat by the Turian Army.

"Well, well, well, seems some of our ships got away after all, and got the information to Councillor Velarn…" Nihlus said. "Though I wonder how the hell they took so long to either get there or make the decision to send the information to Palaven…"

After the combat footage ended, Councillors Velarn, Tevos and Armin popped back up on the projector, Armin spoke first "After careful deliberation," it was at this point that Saren decided to theatrically do a faceplant, using his arms to brace himself from harm. This roused a wave of laughter among those Turians still awake to see it, which was all of the POWs, considering that the news of Palaven being under attack had spread rapidly and woken every Turian up. "It was decided that this information may be critical to the survival of the Hierarchy as a viable political entity."

Councillor Velarn's exaggerated facepalm drew another wave of morbid laughter, as did Tevos' next words "After weighing the consequences, the Council has decided that we should send all available Intel on these aliens so that Palaven may better defend itself against them when the time comes for the Siege."

"Does anyone else have second thoughts about being a Spectre, agent of the Council?" Nihlus said in a sarcastic tone "If so, please raise your hand now." His hand went up, along with Saren's.

"Hey Dad, is it just me or is the Citadel intelligence service REALLY slow?" Faran piped up after noticing the timestamp on the transmission, two minutes ago. It had taken almost that long for the Elite Four to decide to release the transmission to the captured Turians and occupied planets to take down their morale. "Or do you think it was jamming?"

Velarn finally spoke up "I recommend gathering all the nearby fleets at Palaven in preparation for eliminating the enemy as they come in with their troopships."

"I'd say it's jamming, son." Saren said, as the secondary hologram faded. "The idiots still haven't figured out that the enemy does not use troopships… I almost cannot wait to see the look on the faces of the Hierarchs when they see their very first Light Assault Bot, towering over them by as much as three times their height." Indeed, Light Assault Bots were, on average, about seven or eight meters tall, depending on the model/faction. (1.8 meters times 4 is 7.2 meters)

* * *

_Turian Hierarchy Capital City, Palaven, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 14:50_

Thousands of Mass Accelerator weapons, some of which were designed to give orbital cruisers pause, were now oriented over the walls of the Capital City of the Turian Hierarchy. It was from here that several enemy scout groups had been destroyed (consisting of T2 units and built only to test the defences), raising the morale of the defenders, who had been in fear since the word had spread of almost four hundred colonies lost within a day to this new enemy. The defenders were now determined to protect their city with whatever it took.

Their one problem was a relative shortage of artillery units. Usually, the Turian Hierarchy would deploy Gunships/Bombers (the gunships were fast enough and flexible enough to be used as bombers) to do the job, using their speed and manoeuvrability, shields absorbing the occasional hit. This enemy's Anti-Air firepower was simply too strong for that. The worst thing about Council Races' Mass Accelerator weapons was the fact that though they were extremely accurate in direct fire, they used small slugs at high speed.

Their closest counterparts among the Coalition, the UEF, used massive, explosive slugs at relatively low speed to enable units to fire over obstacles. The closest thing the Turians had for the purpose at the moment was the anti-orbital guns re-programmed for much lower muzzle velocity and refitted for a larger slug.

The net result? Something that rivalled the Emissary T3 Heavy Artillery in range (360 kilometers) but fired a shell still considered puny by the Coalition, only about 1 ton, dealing about 250 tons TNT equivalent of kinetic energy with each impact. This translated into, using pulse overcharge of structural fields, about 500 damage points per hit to structural fields or shields. This was about equal to a third of a T3 Serenity Mobile Heavy Artillery's single-shot firepower, 1425 points. However, the fast reload of these guns, one shot per five seconds, meant a firing rate four times that of a single Serenity.

And so, when the first four-legged, immense war machine became visible, the specially landscaped terrain around each Turian City allowing vision form long distances (courtesy of being on a plateau and flattening the surrounding terrain), the guns fired as one. The shells crossed the dozens of kilometres of distance in under a second, even for the slowest of shells, and impacted the megalithic machine (which, incidentally, the Coalition called a Megalith) to absolutely no effect, having been deflected by the Two Athanahs mounted atop the Megalith. This was a strategy Shepard herself had invented, forcibly landing Shield Generators and Flak on top of a Megalith and having the units deploy (secure) themselves. The only reason it was not done on Fatboys was because of the fact that the Fatboy's top hull was already used for air staging and assembly space for units. Plus, Fatboys already had Flak and shields. For the Galactic Colossus, the shoulders had become essentially hard points able to carry one T3 or T2 unit each, most commanders opting for an Athanah and a Banger, but some choosing a Serenity for artillery power.

The combined jaws of the Turian defenders went slack as one as the glowing shield deflected their efforts. The mighty machine fired back, throwing out four glowing yellow shells that arced across the terrain to smash into the heavy, shielded walls that defended the Capital. Throwing out three volleys in four seconds, the megalith quickly took down the wall's shields, the next volley blew a massive hole in the city wall. The defenders kept firing, and eventually the shields fell and the Megalith started taking hits, with no observable damage, as it stopped and kept bombarding the city. Two absolutely MASSIVE, more or less flat, Landcruiser-like units, each with a clearly visible shield field, rolled up to either side of it and covered it with their shields, while numerous two-legged walkers walked past the artillery group and toward the city's walls. The ground shook with each footfall, and with each impact of the shells. The two shielded units' shells, twelve fired per second arced over the wall and started slamming into the shields of the repurposed Artillery installations.

* * *

"You know, those static shields are actually pretty tough… and the repurposed anti-orbital guns aren't half bad either" Williams noted.

"I agree, and to be honest I'm almost surprised the UEF took so long to make the Fatboy Triple Gauss Cannons fully traversable." Hackett said "Well, unless something that's T3 is being built, or if there's Air Staging being used, in which case all the guns are limited to various degrees."

"Well, there goes the wall shields" this was Shepard's reply "March the Assault Experimentals up, Williams! Seth, do you think we should bring out Air Experimentals? That's just a question, by the way." Shepard spoke while coordinating the fire of the Fatboys and Megaliths that advanced behind the first Megalith.

"Quite frankly, yes, Ahwassas, coupled with Ambassadors or Shocker Strategic Bombers, would get rid of those artillery installations in short order." Shockers did the most damage per bomb, while the Seraphim one, the Sinntha, did second most and had more health than the Shocker. Revenants were the lowest in health and damage, but were commonly considered the best Strategic Bombers because of their Stealth and the fact that, like the Ambassador, they had a secondary AA weapon that allowed them to take down Interceptors and Fighter/Bombers when necessary. In this case, however, as Ahwassa Experimental Bombers were NOT stealthed, the Ambassador's extra durability and firepower would make it a better choice compared to the Revenant, and its splash damage was better than the Shocker or Sinntha.

"I recommend Shockers, for less collateral damage." Hackett said simply. "And Seth? I think you should get on it, like, now."

"No problem."

The defenders were utterly stunned when ten low-flying aircraft, each two hundred and fifty meters long and wide, flew toward their City's walls at high speed. The stunning part? The fact that the massive aircraft were NOT SYMMETRICAL! Each was followed by a few smaller aircraft that looked symmetrical. Hundreds of Surface-to-Air missiles flew into the massive juggernauts, without doing any visible damage. The juggernauts each dropped one glowing, blazing ball of light, before the smaller bombers dropped one smaller bomb each.

Fifty-five kilotons, each, of directed energy smashed the shields over each of the artillery pieces, along with the pieces themselves, to masses of melted metal. Then the Quark Bombs of the Shockers smashed into the surrounding Anti-Air batteries and shield emitters, reducing them to scrap, the bombs were "only" ten kilotons each in yield. Collateral Damage was kept to a minimum due to the almost non-existent splash of the Quark Bombs and the fact that the Artillery pieces were situated in clearings.

Now that the artillery of the Turians was gone, the Elite Four could have just retreated over the horizon, out of the line of fired of the enemy mass accelerators, and pounded the city defences to dust from long range. However, they agreed to be nice and not risk too much collateral damage. So, they brought out the Monkeylords and Galactic Colossi.

* * *

160-meter tall, six legged war machines walked over the battlefield, mostly of a dark colour scheme, they oriented their 100-meter long topside guns at the Turians. The Turians, now that their line of fire at their first target was blocked, started firing at the nearest of the six-legged machines, rounds pining off of it without effect. The machines covered 15 of the 45 kilometres that remained between the Coalition lines and the Turian Capital City before starting to open fire with their main weapons. The smaller guns had been firing the whole time, their red glowing bolts slowly reducing the Turian wall guns to flaming scrap. The enormous read beams that landed next upon the walls simply swept across and blew the walls apart, detonating and vaporizing the once-mighty walls. The two-legged war machines had opened up a little earlier, their bright, bluish-purple beams shredding the towers that were part of the wall.

Having utterly lost the first defence line, the Turian forces, what remained of them, retreated into the city proper. It was time for urban warfare; it was time for the Turian Hierarchs, who had just received combat footage sent by the Citadel Council, to know fear.

* * *

_East of Primary City, Continent Two, Shanxi, 2:55 AM Groundside Time, 12 September, 3865_

_T plus 14:55_

"Idiots" This was the commentary by Faran Arterius on retreating into the city to start a campaign of urban warfare to buy time for reinforcement fleets.

"Yes, that is the correct conclusion, son." Saren said. "But then again, the defenders have only seen the Siege Assault Bots, Heavy Armour, Armoured Assault Bots, and Mobile Flak, in addition to the Experimentals, so they must have concluded that urban warfare would give them a slight advantage in that Experimentals could not hope to fit in the streets, and neither could the wider normal units. They also expected enemy marines, not Mech Marines, and they didn't expect the resistance to tech attacks such as overload pulses and such, nor the immense weight of the units rendering Biotics effectively useless."

Nihlus sighed "Why oh why did the Anime Law of Tactical Unreliability aka Anime Law 21 have to apply here?" He was ruffling his fringe when he suddenly froze. "Why are you all staring at me like that?"

"Oh, nothing Nihlus, just… never mind."

* * *

"Ugh, those assholes, we try our best to keep their civilians unharmed and what do they do? Draw us into their cities." The rest of the planet was reporting similar occurrences. "Send in Mech Marines and task them to anti-infantry duty, and use Bricks for anti-armour and anti-air, Shepard Out." She hung up on the Operational Command channel "I don't think the others will need artillery support, but we will, for that inner fortress, probably the home of the Turian Hierarchs. We'll send Serenities once the city is cleared of hostile forces, or we can just use Restorers to level that wall and the Anti-air batteries, then land troops to capture the Hierarchs. Which one do you guys prefer?"

"I vote for a combination." Hackett said, and the other two agreed.

Thus, a wing of Restorers, with a Continental, flew over the city, along with a CZAR. The Restorers took down the AA installations with a hailstorm of Quad Light Laser fire, and then the CZAR burned away the wall and defences surrounding the inner fortress. This was after the T3 Combat Engineers landed by the Continentals had nanolathed a wall around the fortress. The Turian Hierarchs were now cornered; they could only pray that the reinforcement fleets arrive soon enough.

* * *

Thousands of kilometres above the surface of Palaven, four full Turian Sector fleets along with the Palaven Home clashed with three Hunter Squadrons of the Coalition of Species. Both sides were at knife-fighting range, the Turians pouring all the GUARDIAN laser, Mass Accelerator, and Disruptor Torpedo fire they could at the Coalition. The Coalition warships belched destruction from their Zealot Space Interception Missiles, Quantum Cannons, Proton Cannons (Dual and Heavy), Oblivion Cannons (Light and Medium), Dual Plasma Beams, Ravager Plasma Chainguns, Lao Tactical Missile Racks, and Sonance Artillery. The smaller craft fielded by the Coalition, Geminis and Restorers, were constantly rising from the planet and exiting the Coalition's three Escort Carriers. They used their own Zealot AAMs (Air-to-Air Missiles), Nanite Missiles, and Quad Light Lasers to chip away at the Turian fleet.

The Palaven Home Fleet had six dreadnoughts, and each sector fleet had two. The Turians also had hundreds of cruisers and frigates. Each Coalition Hunter Squadron had an Escort Carrier, four Heavy Cruisers, eight Light Cruisers, and twelve destroyers, in addition to twenty-four frigates and forty corvettes. All in all, the Coalition side had three Escort Carriers, 12 Heavy Cruisers, 24 Light Cruisers, 36 Destroyers, 72 Frigates, and 120 Corvettes. The third Hunter Squadron, if it had arrived earlier, would have allowed the annihilation of the Palaven Home Fleet before the four Sector Fleets arrived, but unfortunately, it did not.

The Turian side had 14 dreadnoughts, 200-some cruisers and 400-some frigates. The overwhelming numbers were effectively balanced by the groundside manufacturing; the Coalition fleet would have been quickly annihilated had it not been for groundside Mavor fire and the Geminis and Restorers. Over a thousand Geminis swarmed the dreadnoughts, one by one, while hundreds of Restorers went toe-to-toe with the enemy frigates.

This was disregarding the fact that a Corvette and a Turian Frigate were almost equal, with the disruptor torpedoes giving the Turians a slight advantage in firepower, but a Coalition Corvette could take a dreadnought shell without being destroyed. In addition, every single Coalition ship was equipped with large numbers of Zapper TMDs and some with Will-O-The-Wisp Flares, which could not effectively be overwhelmed by fire. A Coalition Frigate's Loa Tactical Missile Racks, Light Oblivion Cannon, Ravager Plasma Chainguns, dual Proton Cannon, Quantum Cannons and Zealot Missiles gave it hitting power on par with Turian cruisers. The Frigate had to orient at its enemy to use its fixed nose guns, the Ravagers, effectively, however, so it was at a disadvantage in this respect. Despite this, it was again far superior in terms of actually having a structural integrity field and in terms of raw shield power.

Overall, the fleet were almost evenly matched in terms of power, the balance slightly in favour of the Turians, up until the Aerospace Superiority Fighters and AA Gunships joined the fight. The Frigates were overwhelmed by massed Restorers, their GUARDIAN suites unable to handle so many missiles at once, and their armour boiled away by the incessant firing of the Quad Light Lasers that made up a Restorer's anti-ground weapons. The Cruisers fared little better against the thousands of missiles put out by the Geminis filling up their threat boards and overwhelming their GUARDIAN systems, allowing volleys of Loa Tactical Missiles to rip them wide open with 3 kilotons of explosive energy each. Even the Loa Tactical missiles that were hit by the GUARDIAN lasers still hit their targets with four fractions of 300 tons TNT equivalent yield each. This quickly proved a bit much for the Turians to just sit there and take, and so the Cruisers and Frigates mostly started closing to point blank for increased accuracy against the Coalition warships.

So far, the Coalition had lost most of its Frigates, which had been targeted first for their relative ease to kill and their Loa Tactical Missile Racks and Ravagers. The Corvettes had mostly joined up with the fighter wings, providing anti-missile support, against Turian disruptor torpedoes. The Turian Fleet had also lost almost all of its frigates, half its cruisers, and were starting to take damage to the dreadnoughts. Even as the hordes of Geminis with Corvette cover strafed a dreadnought and began blowing armour plates off the hull, another dreadnought took four simultaneous Mavor hits, its shields having been weakened by Loa and Sonance fire, and broke up. It was the third Turian dreadnought to be lost under overwhelming fighter and gunship fire, more and more of which were rising from the surface to join in the battle in orbit as primary city after primary city fell.

The Capital ships of the Hunter Squadrons had indeed all taken hits, however due to their manoeuvring they never took enough damage to take out the structural fields (as in the red zone of HP bars). Thus, the Coalition crewed ships all remained intact and no crew were lost. This was because Hunter Squadrons never had crew on the Frigate Groups they included.

From the surface, dozens of Mavors fired continuously at the Turian cruisers and dreadnoughts, taking out a cruiser in two hits, but taking a lot longer to take down a dreadnought. The ninety Commanders on-planet were all sending as many Geminis and Restorers as they could while their countless factories and carriers rapidly cranked out more. In the end, when the dust settled, over a thousand Geminis would have been lost, and over 500 Restorers, in addition to all but three Corvettes and one battered Frigate. The capital ships of the Hunter Squadrons, however, all remained more or less intact (no crew members died even from the few direct hits to armour), while the Turians were annihilated and had to be picked up by fleets of Continentals tasked to recovery of escape pods, which the Coalition had purposefully not harmed in the battle. It was hailed as a great victory…

* * *

"Great victory my ass" Shepard grumbled sourly. "They should not have lost so many ships and aircraft; I could have pulled it off without losing half as much as the idiots up there did…"

"Come on, Shepard, the battle only started forty minutes ago, with skirmishing, it's not like we've been eating popcorn here…" Hackett whined, earning a glare from Williams and Shepard "Ariel, you do realize I was mimicking an annoying six-year-old?"

"Wait, you're not one? Why was I not informed?" Seth faked shock. "Well, no, we haven't been eating popcorn, we've been eating our gourmet rations while our units are slowly clearing out the city of resistance." He held up a spoon loaded with fried rice and shoved it in his mouth while tapping out more commands on his control console with his other hand. "This is delicious…"

"Okay, anyways, Hackett, you want to do the honours of capturing the Palace and herding all the Hierarchs out so we can discuss the surrender of the Turian Hierarchy?"

"Fine by me, I'll negotiate their surrender and the establishment of a treaty of non-aggression, we don't want any of their planets anyways, they're all dextro-worlds, and the Coalition is all levo-amino species." Hackett said. "Any particular reason you wanted it to be me?"

"Oh, not really, except for the fact that after Shanxi I'm more inclined to demand their disarmament and that never goes well…" Williams rolled her eyes "Ever hear of Germany after World War I?"

"Never knew you were a history geek" that was Seth.

"Well, I am, now, Seth, Shepard, why don't you want to do it?" Ariel was in fact genuinely curious.

"Well, I'm really inclined to completely occupy their territory and assimilate them into the Coalition as a race, but from what our data has said they are already a member of something called the Citadel Council." Shepard said "I want Hackett to be the one to negotiate with the Council, it sounds big and he's the best at diplomacy."

"Hmm, makes sense" Seth commented "I don't want the job because these scaly bastards" Seraphim had metallic plates in their skin, not scales "remind me so much of the Seraphim Loyalists, with their wanton use of weapons of mass destruction against civilians, that if I tried to negotiate in my SCU I might try to make a gesture and accidentally step on them… We all know an 18600-ton SCU is not very nice to be stepped on by."

"You think a 36000-ton ACU coming down on them would be a nice proposition?" Indeed, all the ACUs of the Coalition weighed, oddly, about 36000 tons. "I feel like stomping on the bastards too!" Hackett said "However, in the interest of galactic peace, if this citadel Council actually exists, I will head negotiations, I guess."

* * *

The fifteen Turian Hierarchs, one from each sector of the Hierarchy and three from Palaven, were trembling as they stood on the ground, along with all the other personnel in the palace. The invaders had declared that any who left the building would not be harmed, and that they would destroy the building in 10 minutes. So, not seeing any choice and watching the walkers outside vaporize air cars with single bolts from their weapons pushed the Hierarchs into complying. They stood in the shadows cast by the machines in the afternoon sun and came to abrupt realizations of the sheer size of the machines, the smallest of which were a good ten meters tall. That was when the trembling and whispers had started. The machines stood outside the palace stoically, their weapons aimed at the ground or held horizontally, not pointed at the Turians, but they all knew that could change at any moment.

When the giant red holographic timer reached 00:00, the Combat Engineer responsible took the first shot. Twin laser beams lanced out and smashed into the front wall of the palace, blowing a sizeable chunk out of the armoured wall. A hailstorm of missiles and Disintegrator Pulse Laser bolts came from above, from a gigantic beetle-shaped gunship that rained down destruction. The walkers on the ground opened fire as well, the Plasma Cannons and Disintegrator Pulse Lasers (some Heavy DPL as well) tearing at the palace's armoured wall until it was breached. Then the tallest of the walkers, on two legs, charged up their larger arm guns, the Ionized Plasma Cannons, and fired. The weapons were so called because of the fact that it was a stream of superheated electrons and bar atomic nuclei fired, unlike the typical cations (positive ions) and electrons of normal plasma, which had much lower potential energy and damage power. The bolts, doing almost a kiloton TNT's worth of damage each, smashed into the Palace compound and kept going, blowing up as they moved, turning the entire compound into a raging inferno into which more shots were fired, an Ahwassa dropping a bomb for good measure, once the Turians had been herded inside a truck for their own protection.

The Turians were then treated to the sight of ten T3 Engineers reclaiming the debris and then rebuilding the entire palace in under a minute. After the shock and awe campaign was over and done with, the Turian Hierarchs were confronted with the visage of the United Earth Federation's General Hackett, smiling.

"Hello, Turian Hierarchs, how was your day?" Hackett smiled.

"Did you even have to ask?" That was the response he got. "Where are you anyways?"

The ground began to shake rhythmically "On my way, it'll be just a moment…" The shaking grew louder and more violent. The collected Turians had a hard time staying upright, until four gigantic bipedal machines walked single file down the largest street in the city, their arms held out to not smash apartments apart while walking. "Well, I'm the blue one, the others are piloted by the other three commanders in this assault force." The blue, blocky, clunky looking metal biped raised its right arm and waved, then stooped down a little, projecting a hologram of Hackett's smiling face once more.

"So, shall we get started?" Hackett said calmly to the shocked faces of the Turian Hierarchs.

* * *

"Hold on, Hackett, we have a transmission from a newly arrived ship in-planet claiming to be from a political entity called the Citadel Council, asking if there is a chance they could help broker a peace between us and the Turian Hierarchy. They say they have received our First Contact Package that we'd sent into their space and are interested in opening relations. They also claim that the Turian Hierarchy is a major player in their alliance and that they would like to broker a peace" Shepard read, her eyes scanning down the console.

"Let them come, President Hall, Doctor Brackman, Princess Rhianne, and Prime Minister Ratheen expected something like this. After all, it was clearly labelled on Turian Galactic maps that the space that the Turian Hierarchy borders everywhere is clearly labelled Council Space most of the time. Only the two Spectres, according to them, spec ops agents of this 'Citadel Council' sent along on this mission, had their maps of the Asari Republics and Salarian Union" Hackett responded.

"Well, I'm gonna patch through the link to our leaders now, and that Council ship can serve as a relay to the Council." Williams said "Let them hammer out the peace terms, we need to take a break anyways."

"Does it have anything to do with your PMS-ing?" Seth asked cheekily, earning a glare, and, once the four Commanders had left the Hierarchs alone, a swift right hook to the back of his ACU's head/cockpit, along with a kick to the back of the right knee, causing his ACU to land face-first into a rather large storage tank at a sewage treatment facility they were passing by. "Aw come on, Williams, I'm gonna have to take my ACU to the ACU-wash again… unless I want to murder the maintenance techs with the smell…"

"That was kind of the point, Seth." Hackett said after wondering of the Seraphim had a sense of humour whatsoever.

* * *

After several days of negotiations, the Coalition-Council peace treaty was signed and the Humans and Seraphim established a combined embassy on the Citadel. The Drell had a major culture shock in store when they discovered the members of their race taken by the Hanar had prospered, and welcomed them home with open arms. The Hanar's opinions on the matter were "Finally, we can get rid of those absurdly dry domed cities!"

However, unbeknownst to everyone except Princess Rhianne, who had sensed something was on its way, the drums of war had not even come close to being silenced. In the dark vastness of space, a mighty ship's systems began to come online, slowly powering up after 50,000 years of slumber, its timer counting down from 0:300:00:00:00 to activation (300 days). However, once it awakened, it would face an enemy it had not expected, the Coalition of Species, along with a never-before-seen (by Reaper eyes) tech tree.

* * *

A/N: Next Chapter, Saren's going to find Sovereign, and wander around it shortly before the ships becomes active, then… MASS EFFECT 1 WILL ROLL! Nihlus will also be onboard the ship at the time of activation, or it would be a boring chapter indeed.

I know it wasn't much of a siege, but still the tech disparity is simply too immense on the ground.

By the way, who thinks that Saren, i.e. Mr Funny Spectre Number One, should be shot with a Cybran Assimilation Gun by Shepard on the Presidium after his defeat? That way we can have Saren, rehab-ed by the Cybran Nation bang his head against the wall of the Council Chambers while trying to convince the council that Sovereign was NOT a Collector creation. (Note: Saren will not be shot in the head; instead, Sovereign's avatar will merely control him until he gets killed, with a volley to the chest. Then Saren can be resurrected a la Cybran Assimilation of the circuitry in him…)

So, please vote on the poll on my profile and review with any questions/critiques, I will endeavour to respond in the next chapter posted, or incorporate appropriate suggestions. Thank You for reading.


	8. A Sovereign Awakes

A/N: Sorry for the rollover nature of the battles in the previous chapter. If the Turian fleet had attacked the Coalition battle group, then a single Hunter Squadron, they would have won, hands down. But they chose to wait for reinforcements, and they waited forty-five minutes. A Gemini can be built in sixty seconds, a Restorer in something like 131 seconds I believe, that's at a T3 Air Factory, Atlantis, Keefer, and Command-class carriers are faster, and so are CZARs.

ANSWERS TO SOME REVIEWS:

- The Loyalty Gun will not work on the Geth, because in-game it can work on a CYBRANASAURUS REX which is _**part organic**_, so in theory the Coalition could capture Reapers with it… no.

- The Coalition only holds 60% of a quadrant of the Galaxy but more than half the habitable worlds due to their ability to effectively and quickly terraform a wide variety of planets.

- Shiva Prime may come in, if it does, it will be a piece of Reaper technology, used by the Reapers for creating new habitable worlds for future species to colonize and multiply on once they have destroyed the current advanced civilizations aka a greenhouse (or other agricultural facility of your choice) building machine.

- The Council have absolutely NO dominion whatsoever over the Coalition, they will not get any tech either. Very few elements of human society leak out, and none of their tech, especially weapons tech, however expect N7's to have access to the newest prototype infantry weapons, which they need for covert ops that are actually covert by the rest of the Galaxy's standards (not gating in an ACU with stealth systems… which is not exactly all that covert)

* * *

Chapter 8: A Sovereign Awakes

_Unknown Region of Space, 9 July, 3866_

"For the record, I am bored, very bored." That was Nihlus Kryik, a Spectre.

"Does it look like I'm not?" That was Saren Arterius, his old friend, also a Spectre.

"No." Nihlus raised his head from the desk, where he had been nodding off, while his hands mechanically kept up the cleaning of his assault rifle. "Can you at least try to find a topic to keep me reasonably awake with? The boredom's getting to my brain."

"Got any ideas as to why we're stuck out here on a recon mission, Nihlus?" Saren Arterius drummed his fingers against the nearby console, also in extreme boredom.

"Probably because the Council secretly blames us for that fiasco ten months ago with the Coalition of Species, they probably think we should have given the late Admiral better advice on a course of action, and more importantly not gotten our asses stuck in the city while the fleet was preparing the asteroid strike." Nihlus replied, collapsing his assault rifle and stowing it on his armour while taking out his pistol and checking it.

There was a long, excessively long, pause "That was a run-on sentence, I think, and I'm not sure the grammar's quite right." Saren deadpanned.

Nihlus put his head down on the table with a small thud, then knocked his head into the table two more times "The things boredom drives us to do…"

"I agree."

Another long, comfortable pause later… "Saren?"

"What is it, Nihlus?"

"What is the meaning of life?" That was the deadpan answer.

It was Saren's turn to be annoyed, and in his case, he opted for a very, very loud facepalm. After it was over and done with, he noticed something "Hey, Nihlus, we have a contact, we finally found something after all this annoying charting the Council's making us do!"

"What is it?" Nihlus was instantly beside Saren at the main console of their frigate, his pistol still packing itself away, such was the speed with which a bored Turian could leap to external stimuli.

"It seems to be… a ship." Saren's brow plates had gone up.

"A big ship" Nihlus said, looking at the approximate scanner readouts, according to visual sensors at this range.

"A VERY big ship" Saren amended the comment.

* * *

"Is it just me or does this… random gigantic ghost ship seem a bit off?" Saren commented as they flew around the enormous vessel, easily dwarfing even the Destiny Ascension, a 1.4 kilometre long dreadnought built by the Asari Republics and serving as what the humans called "Air Force One" duty in addition to being part of the defence fleet.

"I think it looks a bit weird too, I mean, look at the squid-like arms, they give me a bad feeling… also, the scanners read an active element zero core. That is impossible, if there was an element zero core of that size active for however many years this ship's been sitting in this nebula for, it would have suffered a meltdown already and destroyed it."

"You think we should take a closer look? After sending a report, of course." Saren asked his partner.

"I don't see why not, after we do a through external visual recording of the ship."

* * *

Nazara, aka Sovereign, was bored.

Extremely, irritatingly, absurdly bored.

Being the Vanguard was totally NOT all it was cracked up to be, according to other Reapers who had been on the duty in the past, but no, Nazara just had to volunteer herself for the job. She, as the other Reapers had begun to refer to it as in irritation at her cosmetic patterns and life habits fitting the female stereotype for nearly every sentient species assimilated so far, just had to not listen to their advice and volunteer herself… Great, she was beginning to refer to herself as a she as well… Hey look! Contacts! Well, her stupid start-up sequence and/or timer still had a good two hours to go, damn, she couldn't afford to become active too early, an element zero core more or less inactive for 50,000 years couldn't be rushed… much.

* * *

"This one is of the opinion that this ghost ship is creepy." Nihlus said.

"To quote an old human phrase at you, Hallelujah, tell me something I DON'T know…" Saren said, swinging his assault rifle around to cover the door that Nihlus was opening. "Clear."

"You notice how dark and lifeless this place is? It reminds me of those human vids from their twenty-first and twentieth century's about zombie apocalypses." Nihlus said, once they had reached what appeared to be the bridge.

"True, Nihlus, I have a bad feeling too, and we couldn't open any of the doors besides the ones that guided us here, I have a feeling that something's watching us. We should probably leave…" Saren said, looking around at the dark, dank interior of the massive chamber they were now in, zooming in on the creepier features with his eyepiece.

A console popped up and a message began to scroll down it in an unknown language, prompting Saren to record it while Nihlus covered him. The message came to nothing, however, as it began to repeat after five minutes or so, and did not match any known language whatsoever.

* * *

Nazara was amused by the antics of the sentients. Judging by their ship, it was again the time for an invasion and for the birth of new Reapers. She would continue to repeat the litany of random symbols on the screen for a while so that she could adequately implant a mental suggestion into the head of that one called Saren. She felt that he would be very useful as an information source and as a link between her and any sentients foolish enough to aid the Reapers, as there invariably were, considering the patterns of the past millions of years.

Excellent, the suggestion implantation, with her indoctrination procedure, was complete. The sentients could be allowed to leave now, and she would need to move soon thereafter, she wasn't as naive as some of the younger Reapers, who believed that they were invulnerable. She remembered one of the Reapers born alongside her, who had been destroyed in battle with the race that was, according to galactic news of the last time she'd awakened to discharge her drive core, a mere 2000 years ago, called the Protheans. It was probably still out drifting in space somewhere, as the idiot deserved, charging into the middle of a Prothean battle group in such reckless fashion…

Anyways, the cycle was about to begin again, and Nazara, the Vanguard of this cycle, would be ready to do her duty when the time, and signal from the fleet, came, as it inevitably would once she sent off her newest report. "Vanguard reporting, the technology has advanced enough to be assimilated, will prepare to send signal to Citadel."

* * *

"Well, Nihlus, we're leaving, I don't like the way this ship seems to pulse with life without any signs of living things." Saren looked around uneasily.

"Alright, partner. We're getting out of here." Nihlus exited the door after Saren, retracing their steps in the dreadnought's vast halls to their frigate.

Unbeknownst to them, the ship they were onboard was currently cursing up a storm.

* * *

The closest translation to English of what Nazara was howling was "FUUUUUUU-!" Followed by unintelligible screaming, and then something roughly along the lines of… "Damned fucking Protheans, I knew we should have used more controls on the Keepers!"

What provoked the response was the earlier response of "Fleet ready, send the signal." She did so, and her response was an enormous shock, and that was a difficult proposition when discussing a seven-kilometre-long sentient warship.

"ACCESS DENIED"

"What?" Nazara's weapons suddenly all either dilated or dropped open in shock. "I must have been stuck out here for too long…" She proverbially rubbed her eyes, shook her head around to clear it, and sent the signal again.

"ACCESS DENIED"

Nazara, once she'd closed up her weapons ports while the two sentients left on their puny, primitive ship, began throwing her fit. In the end, she came to the conclusion that for the first time in the long, long history of the Reapers, the manual switch on the Citadel would have to be thrown. Despite the weak nature of the ships analysis of the news reports showed, she realized that, surprisingly not for the first time, the Reapers would have to get allies to distract the fleets surrounding the Citadel. Though the manual switch was not that difficult, it did take some time, and the Reapers would not take the risk of the Vanguard being exposed to fire for such a long time, especially fire of such volume.

* * *

_Ten Months Ago_

_12-17 September, 3865_

Aboard the Migrant Fleet, millions of Quarians were gathered together, mutely watching footage of the invasion by the Coalition of Species spreading into Turian Hierarchy Space with alarming speed. Only the critical personnel were still on-station as they watched the powerful Turian Hierarchy be utterly steamrollered by this new alien faction. They then watched the footage of ground combat from Hierarchy Army units, and were almost collectively shocked onto their combined asses by how easily the Landcruisers and gunships of the Hierarchy, so resilient to standard weapons in Council Space, were cut down by the Coalition's units.

Then they, after several shifts of work, watched the summarized footage of the signing of the Coalition-Council Peace Treaty. They watched as the Coalition utterly denied technological sharing and refused to cease AI use, even going so far as to send what was called a Cybran as part of negotiations, backing it up with an offer of peace, an offer that the Council could not refuse. The Quarians were utterly shocked by the idea of AI Twining by the Cybrans, and the Infinite War, a 1200-year-long war of extermination between the three largest factions that now made up the Coalition. Then the brutality of the Seraphim War again astounded not only the Quarians, but also the reporters to whom the press release was conducted, of every Council Race.

Most of the Quarians were glad to hear that the only other species in Citadel Space without a Homeworld, the Drell, could now go home. If only they could kick the damned Geth off their worlds and do the same… at least the Geth had not pursued them after they had left the Perseus Veil…

The Migrant Fleet collectively decided that they would stay away from Coalition Space if at all possible; the newest superpower on the galactic map seemed a bit too aggressive. This was concluded once they saw the Coalition demand to establish an orbital station over Palaven and to maintain occupation of a hundred Turian Hierarchy colonies in exchange for peace. The Coalition's citing the death of 110 million innocents due to asteroid warfare as the reason for this horrified the Quarians, all 17 million that remained of their once-proud race. Suffice it to say that anti-Turian sentiments would be high in the fleet for many years, such an evil action was almost worthy of the Geth… Still, the Migrant Fleet would not intrude on Coalition space, not only for fear, but also for the odd shortage of functional Mass Relays in their space… as well as the quadrant of the galaxy next to their space…

* * *

_Present Day_

_Coalition Space Dock, in orbit around Procyon, 15 November, 3866_

"And there she is, the CSC Orizaba, the first of the Coalition's Battle Cruisers…" the engineer said "By the standards of the rest of the galaxy, it's a dreadnought, packing a three-kiloton per second Heavy Microwave Laser, the same as the one fitted on the Monkeylord, and two two-kiloton per second Phason Lasers, like those of Galactic Colossi, for primary armament, and she's all yours, Division Commander Shepard. Also, please stow your ACU away in its ACU bay once you are ready to board, it does have an on-board quantum teleporter for your personal use. Enjoy." The tech left Hannah Shepard at the boarding ramp on the bottom of the ship, looking up at the 800-meter vessel with a stupid grin on her face.

She then boarded, greeted the crew, gave a speech, and did everything a Captain, or rather Rear Admiral in her case, was supposed to do on her new ship before retreating to her quarters, which as was typical for Coalition warships, were luxurious. Then she gleefully began to review the specs for her new ship.

Three Triple Gauss Cannons, Two Plasma Accelerator Beams (from Novax Satellites), Two Heavy Oblivion Cannons (like those found on Tempest-class battleships, delivering forty kilotons of yield in concentrated plasma in one shot), and a Sonance Artillery made up the secondary anti-ship armament of her ship. Lighter weapons included four Loa Tactical Missile Racks, each of twelve missiles, eight Medium Oblivion Cannons, 25 Zealot SIM Launchers, 24 Flak pieces, and a whopping twenty-one Ravager Plasma Chainguns. For missile defence, it had eleven Will-O-The-Wisp Tactical Missile Defences and 16 Zapper TMDs. No known ships less than Council dreadnoughts could come close to matching its 160,000 structural integrity and 120,000 shield strength. Like most Coalition ships, although the Council tended to have an edge in health, a dreadnought featuring something close to 300,000 shield strength and lots of armour, the Coalition was far superior in speed, consistency of firepower, and build rate. The most important equalizer, however, was the technology known as the structural integrity field.

All in all, the Coalition Battle Cruisers were some of the best ships known to exist, especially considering how the armour on the ships of the Council races was well-constructed against kinetic rounds but susceptible to lasers, which were the main armament of the Battle Cruisers, and plasma, which constituted most of the secondary armament. It could outfight, outrun or ambush any known ship, and would not be susceptible to the numerical restrictions of the Council races. A Battle Cruiser could be fabricated in any of the major dry-docks, of which there were dozens, in the Coalition in twelve and a half hours, such was the power of Paragon Quantum Resource Generators combined with mass nano-lathing technology.

The Coalition fleet's organization would grow larger. Hunter Squadrons would soon no longer be the top level unit… but for now, the flagship of Hunter Squadrons had transferred to the Battle Cruiser that would be appended to each of the one hundred and twenty Hunter Squadrons in Coalition Space. Most of the work in the Coalition Space Command was done by Hunter Clutches or Frigate groups, this was why there were "so few" full Hunter Squadrons around.

She stopped reading as her console pinged for her attention. She walked over to read the newest e-mail from one Grand Crusader Ariel Williams, her long-time friend and comrade, and another quarter of the Elite Four.

_

* * *

_

From: Ariel Williams (Aeon_of_the_Elite_.CoS)

_Sent: 14 November, 3866 0:14 UT_

_To: Hannah Shepard (Cybran_of_the_Elite_.CoS)_

_Subject: What my daughter said about your son…_

_I have no clue how my daughters managed to hide all records of the e-mail from Sarah to Ash, but, this, this response Ash sent… this is totally LMFAO in so many more ways than one…_

_Read it, Hannah, you'll find it amusing…_

_(FORWARDED)_

_From: Ashley Williams (ashley..)  
Sent: __November 12, 3866 22:03 UT  
To: Sarah Williams (.)  
Subject: Re: Hey sis__(END FORWARDED)_

James left today. He's been reassigned to one of the new Rapid Response Bases out in the Kepler Verge, with some leave before then. Lucky bastard, it's like the ancient American west out there — pirates and slavers coming out of the Terminus Systems all the time. He gets to play the cavalry, riding out in frigates any time someone's house gets burned down.

I made some speech about how he was a valuable asset to the squad and he better make us look good out there, blah blah. I suck at speeches. I was cribbing from something I read back in history class. I don't think anyone noticed.

I'm going to miss him. Don't tell anyone.

So you think James is cute, eh? Yeah, well, when you said I should "go for him" — not gonna happen, kiddo. See, we have rules about "fraternization". You don't do The Deed with your fellow troops, especially if they're under you in rank. There's all sorts of problems that can happen when two people in the same unit get together.

Let's say your unit is in a tight spot. Some bug-eyed aliens are going to overrun the galaxy. They eat babies, smell bad, and don't have elbows. Nasty. You're told to guard the rear. To let everyone else escape, someone is ordered "hold this spot until we're gone." Someone has to be left behind. You think it's going to be someone you're sleeping with?

I've served with these guys for eight months now. Yeah, some of them make me feel tingly (and yeah, James was kinda scruffy-cute). I hope I never have to decide who lives and who dies. But if I have to, my decision can't be muddled up by magic-sparkly-hearts-and-stars feelings.

Anyways, I'm gonna knock off here. I've got dog watch in a few hours. Want to get a shower and a meal before then. Talk to you tomorrow.

- Ash

_If you're not too busy rolling around the captain's quarters of your new Battle Cruiser, I hope you will heed my advice and put on a helmet before you choose to do so in laughter. It seemed like only yesterday when they were getting up to all sorts of hell together as four-year-olds and now she's thinking James is cute, what's next, us being museum pieces? I hope they don't forget the human life expectancy is the longest of all races other than the Asari and Krogan and start making us grandparents before we reach our seventies… You know, we did have children unusually young, and settle down abnormally early, my friend, the average marrying age is fifty now, and the average age at which people have children more like a hundred… a quarter of the way through life… we had our kids in our early twenties… and we kind of advanced through the ranks really fast, eh?_

_See you!_

_Ariel_

* * *

After about a minute of utter silence in the captain's room, a hand shakily grabbed the edge of the desk the console was situated on. Another soon followed and dragged the owner of the hands upward, a shaking Hannah Shepard, still giggling, pulled herself back up, and sat in her seat, which had been pushed across the room to make room for rolling around on the floor. She began to compose her reply…

* * *

A/N: Filler Chapter, along with the introduction of a new class of capital ship for the Coalition side! Expect Battle Cruisers to feature prominently in the First Battle of the Citadel. Battle Carriers will be released later, along with battleships, in time for the Reaper War.

Note that the Ashley Williams e-mail was effectively directly ripped from Mass Effect Wiki. I do not have Mass Effect or Mass Effect 2, so please excuse any inaccuracies in future conversations. Thank you for reading, please do not be too angry at this filler, the action will start rolling in the next chapter, titled "The Skyllian Blitz", but don't worry, the Shepard family is still going to witness the loss of relatives on Mindoir. Hannah Shepard and her ship, the Orizaba, will, alone (to test the Battle Cruiser class as a whole), play a major part throughout the Blitz, which is the Coalition's designation for the entire time span from the attack on Mindoir to the Torfan Campaign.

On the subject of James Shepard, he won't be around during the ME 1 Missions, however I have to give the brothers some good combat experience, expect him as part of the Blitz, alongside John, but then they go their separate ways. He'll probably come in as a team member during ME 2 according to the poll results so far… or later in Mass Effect 1.

THE POLL HAS BEEN REFRESHED WITH ONLY THOSE TWO CHOICES, VOTE NOW!


	9. The Skyllian Blitz

A/N: Please note that the Quarians will not overcome their AI-phobia (and therefore Cybran and therefore Coalition-phobia anytime soon, so they will not get access to the "New Migrant Fleet", which could be built within a week by the Coalition's shipyards, with onboard food/mass fabricators and everything… the Quarians are used to nutrient paste anyways, so it wouldn't be so difficult to adapt…)

I agree with Eldan Varen, the Quarians are in fact more like the Earth Empire; they tried to enslave/eradicate the Geth, much as the Earth Empire tried to exterminate the Cybran Nation and enslave them with the Loyalty Program.

Don't expect too much SupCom 2 stuff, some of the upgrade system can be adopted, however, expect each upgrade component to increase a unit's price, and be optional. A commander can switch an upgrade on/off at any time for a particular unit or all units it affects, if his economy is bad. When it gets better, he can enable upgrades, and idle engineers and units with engineering suites will automatically install the upgrades for any units built without them, at some cost (generally a few mass and some energy per unit…)

* * *

Chapter 9: The Skyllian Blitz

_Mindoir, 20 November, 3866_

"Hey mom, how was the ship?" John Shepard commented first.

"Great, I should bring you boys aboard for a tour sometime! How's your uncle doing?" Hannah Shepard smiled at the screen in her quarters, while the ship was moving toward the Capital City of Mindoir, to show off the might of the newest warships of the Coalition, and make some money with tours. Her twin boys were currently staying at an uncle's place on the other side of the planet, visiting with family was always nice…

"Great mom, so tell us about your ship!" James spoke up.

"Oh, it was okay, I don't get why they didn't put more Heavy Microwave Lasers on instead of Phason Lasers but besides that, it's great, an assortment of all the weapons the Coalition's put on ships so far, the heaviest models available, mostly." James and John were both model kids, nice, helpful, smart, strong, etc. While they were both enthralled by her technogabble, she broached a subject she'd been curious about for a while. "So, boys, any nice girls caught your eyes yet?" She laughed as both lost their balance and landed face-first on the communication console's desk, such was the extent to which they had been leaning forward at the technological descriptions. "Is there something I should know?"

"Uh, no, not at the moment, though guess what! I ran into Ashley again!" James exclaimed "She's still as fun-loving as back when we were all kids"

"I know, Ariel told me that Sarah said she thought you were cute in one of her e-mails to Ashley!" Hannah had thought it was hilarious that one of the sisters of her sons' childhood friend thought her son an interesting specimen…

"Which of us are we talking about?" John questioned.

"Uh, hello, considering that I was the one stationed on Eden Prime after training and the one to meet up with Ashley again, it's rather obvious we're talking about me…" James pointed at himself theatrically, John just facepalmed in response.

"So how far away are you and the fleet?" John asked, from his uncle's house out in the countryside, in one of the few towns without fortifications.

"About four hours, one hour using quantum jump, what's the time there? I mean your local time?"

"About 1:00 PM." They both said at once.

"Good, then expect me and my ACU at around 5:00 PM."

"Alright mom, see you then!"

* * *

The whole plan of the Shepard family went to hell less than ten minutes later as a fleet of Batarian cruisers and frigates came out of FTL on the far side of the planet from its capital and main base areas. The best the civilians manning the command bunker could do was gate in Marine detachments, because they had recently taken the Control Node Network in the region down for repairs. The Mavors that were in the main cities on that side of the world came to life, but they did not knock more than a few ships out of the sky before the Batarians landed near the smaller towns and invaded them, overwhelming local Erupter T1 Point Defence towers with mass accelerator rounds from cruisers and frigates.

SAM batteries on the buildings and Tactical Missile Launchers in the tallest skyscrapers exacted a terrible toll on the Batarians before they were torn apart, which was after the shield generators were destroyed. The local militias put up a valiant resistance using the weapons stored in the armouries, established by the Coalition government on every border colony, but they were overwhelmed and pinned down by sheer numbers. The Batarians, after finally breaching the walled compounds, were brutally efficient in either killing or capturing every human they could. It was in this situation that the Shepard twins found themselves, back to back fighting for their lives with their custom N7 weapons and barriers.

"Get to the armour locker, James, I'll cover you." Lieutenant John Shepard's voice called.

"Understood, moving now." James rolled across the gap between the counter and the next counter, Batarians firing at him as he passed, but being forced down or their aim thrown off by the lethally accurate bolts of John's LBR-1 Laser Battle Rifle. "Alright, bro, I'm suited up" he heard twenty seconds later as James engaged his personal shield generator. "Got some goodies here that'll distract the squints for a bit…" a large yellow ball flew toward the barricades the Batarians were hidden behind, John's eyes widened as he ducked.

The electrons in the Electron Grenade flew apart from their formerly stable configuration and reacted violently with the Oxygen in the air, forming free radicals that instantly ate into whatever was exposed to them. The net result was a sharp crackle of electricity before a large explosion bit into the material of the hotel lobby they were now in. (A/N: Hope that makes scientific sense…)

John took this time to trade places with James, who casually walked in front of the gap and physically shielded John, not that any shooting was coming their way, from possible fire. "Alright, I'm suited up and ready, let's go." Both activated the extra add-ons on their helmets, which lit up the two sets of red bands on the front with an ominous reddish glow. The Cybran helmet was the personal favourite of the twins, though they still enjoyed some of the add-on features of the other armour options they had…

The UEF one had a stronger shield and an over-shield, and the Aeon had more room for Biotics and Tech skills/attacks, in addition to enhancers for the two categories. The Cybran Armour had personal stealth and weapons stabilizers, in addition to decent shields and overall balance. However, those traits were not what tipped the scale, the ominous red of the helmet's "eyes" (which could be rendered transparent in emergencies if needed) and the black colour scheme was what drew many cadets to it.

The twins almost glided down the street in their armour towards the main residential buildings when a corpse, thrown from the building they were currently situated under, landed in front of them. It was one of their neighbours' corpses, and it showed obvious signs of an attempt at use of cranial implants. Since both of them had twined AIs, though without any of the visual signs of Cybran pride, they could tell by the crude appearance of the implants what the probable survival rate would be. John Shepard's response was to casually double-tap every Batarian on the ground floor (that his brother had not nailed) and to begin clearing out the building. From the top floor, the two could see that the building they were on was not, by far not, the only building the Batarians had broken into.

Three of the shorter, UEF-style residential structures were already smoking ruins, the tallest residential building in the settlement, the central spire, appeared to still be intact in the distance (it was to one side of the town), though the twinkling of shields and gunfire told the twins that there was a struggle there.

Hundreds of civilians were being gathered in the central square, herded by Batarians with assault rifles, and being implanted with the same crude devices as the one currently buried in their neighbour's head. Most went essentially berserk and died, however some appeared to have become brainwashed and were herded onto Batarian ships parked there without showing any sign of resistance.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" James was met with the response of John's Laser Battle Rifle locking into sniper mode "beat me to it… ah well. I'll cover you and take a few shots of my own…"

John had already taken the first shots, "Well, James, happy hunting."

"Yes." was James' response as he opened fire as well on the unsuspecting Batarians.

* * *

Twenty minutes prior, the Orizaba had gone to Quantum FTL at the news of unidentified mass effect FTL signatures in orbit of Mindoir. Hannah Shepard was pushing her ship as far as she could, at this rate, it would likely still take half an hour to reach Mindoir. She knew that her sons could handle themselves, but she was still worried, as was natural. She also wondered how her… brother-in-law's, sort of, considering she and the twins' father never had a chance to get married, family was doing…

* * *

A couple dozen Batarians went down before they could even think to return fire, due to John and James dialling their outputs beyond the visible spectrum. After the first two dozen went down, the twins changed places, deploying their gliders and jets and jumping over to the next building. From there, they moved closer to the square, which was in front of the Spire, where more Coalition Marines were pinned down by Batarian suppression fire.

"Deploy your ULPA, James, and get ready to take down that squint APC covering the prisoners" John ordered.

"Will do" James began setting up the Ultra-light Phasic Autogun he carried around in quantum storage, the technological basis for the Coalition soldiers' packs, armour compartments. Of course, it was also the basis for the Poke Balls and backpacks used on one particular planet in Coalition Space that was the location of the area (aka map) known only as "Shards". The ULPA was used as a General-Purpose Machine Gun in the Coalition Marines, one of the few pieces of Seraphim tech successfully incorporated into the Coalition armouries, it was excellent against anything not with shields or structural fields, and satisfactory at chewing through light shielding or armour. It would have been nice if they had access to even one "civilian" truck, of the armoured, fielded, shielded, and armed variety, but they had to use the ULPA…

A single anti-shield resonance pulse from John's underslung grenade launcher overloaded the weak shields over the APC before the ULPA began rattling off pulses, chewing through the armour in seconds and cooking the vehicle off. John had already loaded and fired a second grenade at the highest concentration of Batarians, this time an explosive round. The civilians were smart enough to stay down as their captors were slaughtered by the two marines. Those Batarians that threw down their weapons were knocked out with a melee strike to the head, but those that tried to turn their guns on the civilians were instantly cut down. The ships started lifting off as the now freed civilians began to disperse, and John realized just in time what would happen.

"Everybody, get behind cover!" he shouted before diving behind the APC's wreckage and throwing up a biotic field as well as throwing all reactor energy to shields. A single disruptor torpedo landed near the center of the square, drawing in screaming civilians and Batarians alike mercilessly. The Shepard brothers dug in with their armour's Hunker mode and held on as the square was ravaged, John was hit by a piece of flying debris in the head which hurt, even through the helmet.

After the singularity had settled down, John noted that none of the buildings, those ones with structural fields and lockdowns still intact, seemed even slightly harmed by splash damage. He crawled out from under the piece of wall that leaned against the APC wreck, and looked up at the retreating Batarian ships before starting the trek towards the Spire at the far end of the long rectangle of grass, where battle was still raging and civilians were still being executed.

By the time the two N7 marines got there, there was only one grizzled, middle-aged UEF Marine still standing on the Coalition side, holding off the Batarians from breaking into the Spire and watching helplessly as the civilians still outside were executed. The suppression fire of the Batarians was just too strong for him to kill them fast enough to save the civilians still outside. The N7's made the executioners pay, however, by cutting them down with their GLMGs (Gauss Light Machine Guns) and LBRs. The UEF Marine, now that the pressure was off him, ran over to the Tomcat Autogun he had been cut off from and opened fire on the Batarians.

Considering a Tomcat Autogun, formerly called a Tomcat Light Machine Gun, spat out 40mm munitions, the same ones used by Mech Marines, it did not take much to cut through a Batarian. One glancing shot could take down their shields and another would rip through the armour of the pirates, which was hardly top-of-the-line or in excellent repair. A direct hit was a definite kill. A Coalition Marine's shields could take four hits (0.8 second), an over shield could take two hits, and the armour itself could take another two with its structural fields. In other words, the armour had 8 points, the shields 16, and the over shield 8 points worth of hit points. This was extraordinarily strong by Citadel standards and nothing to laugh at even by Coalition standards, considering the size of the armour compared to most units of similar integrity.

"Hello, Lieutenant, how's the situation?" John said, vaulting over the lieutenant's cover.

"Not good, Lieutenant, my men are all down with injuries, they'll all survive, but they can't move effectively at the moment, we had a rough time gating and holding this place. Fucking squints threw everything they had at us and then blew off the SAM launchers and TML-4 at the top of the tower. We managed to rewire the shields to work, but a lot of the squints got under the shields. The only reason I wasn't overrun was because my men provided cover fire from where they went down in the upper floors." The UEF marine, distinguishable from his armour, standard Marine material, not one of the N7 Armours, and insignia, the logo of the United Earth Federation at the top of his shoulder patch, as opposed to the N7 logo, told the twins.

"Well, I think we have support inbound." James Shepard pointed upward toward the sky, along with the few surviving Batarians, who chose to immediately surrender upon seeing the large ships flash into existence over Mindoir. "That's mom's ship, the CSC Orizaba, the first of the Battle Cruisers, and it's Hunter Squadron." The Freighters bearing the slaves had already jumped away, leaving the cruisers and frigates to take on the fleet.

The forty Corvettes of the fleet immediately descended into atmosphere and began off-loading Loyalist Siege Assault Bots, Brick Armoured Assault Bots, and Mech Marine Light Assault Bots from their hull clamps, which had recently been adapted to carry land units as well as aerospace units. The units quickly cleared out the Batarian ground forces, almost effortlessly, and T3 Combat Engineers, fed resources by the Escort Carrier and Battle Cruiser, repaired the buildings and put up new point defence guns, then brought the Control Nodes back online.

The rest of the "battle" was effectively a cakewalk, the marines tending to their wounded while the bots and tanks secured the region, herding the Batarians to trucks, of the variety where the weapons were locked down and inaccessible. The civilians were allowed to go back to their homes from their lockdowns and shelters, and life returned to some semblance of normality…

"Damn it…" John Shepard was wearing an extremely deep scowl on his 17-year-old face. "they killed them all." The two N7's walked through the square, where thousands of bodies lay under white sheets, to be claimed by loved ones for burial. The twins had discovered their uncle's entire family's remains under one cluster of sheets, their father had not lived to see them born, and so their uncle, his older brother, had become a sort of mentor over their younger years. Now, he was gone, and like what happened the last time someone hurt a member of the Elite Four, they knew that with their mother, there would be hell to pay.

The last time someone had hurt Hannah Shepard, when her twins' father died, she had levelled an entire Order fortress-city with massed use of Stonager, Liberator, and Apocalypse Strategic Missile Launchers followed by several Yolona Oss missiles. Millions of Order members had been vaporized in the two hours of continuous nuclear bombardment, and even today, on the Aeon Illuminate planet of Seraphim IV (the fourth planet in the system the Seraphim were first discovered in, two planets out from the Aeon capital world), there was a massive, smooth glass pool fifty-some kilometres wide that marked the place of the last organized resistance by the Order of the Illuminate.

No one had questioned it, as she had first given the Order civilians a chance to escape, by clearing Order military units out of the city first and sending in evacuation trucks. The first few trucks torched by the civilians got the point across… and so began the total annihilation of the last center of the Order.

* * *

_Akuze, 23 November, 3866_

"Lieutenant, something doesn't feel right…" the pilot of the drop-ship said.

"I agree, why couldn't they first send in some mechs to check the area before dropping forensics teams?" Shepard questioned aloud "Seems clear though…"

The Stinger Gunship parted the cloud cover on the surface of Akuze, the Lieutenant looked out upon the pioneer team's deserted camp, it seemed… off… to him. "Is anyone else reminded of a zombie apocalypse?" The other fifty marines in the aircraft mostly stayed silent, though one or two chuckles and hums of thought were heard.

Corporal Toombs spoke "Sir, are we going to use the Pillar?" the Pillar Heavy Tank of the UEF had gotten a revamp, with an electron autocannon mounted on the back of the turret providing some modicum of anti-air capacity, and they'd brought one along for the mission, though it was now called the Pillar Medium Tank.

"Yes, Corporal, we are going to load up inside the Pillar and use it for an APC, dropping off people to do close-in investigations and covering them."

* * *

If he could do it without causing permanent harm to himself, Dr. Gustav Brackman would currently be banging his head, or rather, brain, against the inside of his tank. Why, WHY had they had to send a unit of marines instead of Mech Marines as he'd requested? The Thresher Maws on Akuze had been detected too late to save the pioneer team, who were doing a recon of the planet's environment directly, after it had been surveyed from orbit, but he'd asked to test MECH Marines against the things! NOT MARINES! Ugh. At least the Marines had a Stinger and a Pillar with them. Oddly, a small quantum distortion in the area was disrupting communications for the moment; he hoped they could survive…

Oh. He realized what had happened once he asked for a replay of his transmission as received by the ship that had dropped the Marines. It read: "Please send *static* Marines to investigate the last confirmed location of the pioneer team on Akuze." If he still had hands, or a face, he'd have facepalmed, testing Mech Marines would be fine, but actual Marines? He just hoped the observation team had enough initiative, especially hoping that Miranda Lawson had enough initiative, to at least give the Marines a warning…

* * *

Miranda Lawson, genetically engineered from the genetic material of former Avatar of War Jaran Marxon, having fled the Order's control when she discovered she was about to be replaced by another, was at a loss as to what to do. She had boldly chosen to burn the remaining genetic samples from the Avatar of War, as any samples from already-engineered "specimens" could not be effectively stimulated to grow again without at least one cycle of normal reproduction, and had chosen to take her sister away from the Order, but she had no clue what to do now. She could send the Marines a transmission asking them to leave and state her authorization and all, but considering they brought a Pillar and a Stinger, they should get out okay…

She wondered what Dr. Brackman would have done, then figured that there was no point dwelling, they had planned to test out MECH Marines against the Threshers Maws, so a Pillar Medium Tank and Stinger Medium Gunship would be an interesting prospect… If things got too serious, she could always give the marines instructions on survival, after all, the quantum disturbance would not affect short-range communications.

One of her researchers reported that the system's primary appeared to be throwing off a solar flare… THAT would interfere with short-range communications. Miranda's first thought was _Uh oh!_ The second was _I hope a Pillar Tank can stand up to/outrun Thresher Maws…_ The third was _I hope they stay in the goddamn tank! And make sure Thresher Maws don't come up from right under them!_

* * *

"Alright men, look around carefully, keep your eyes open and guns ready, we have no clue what happened to these surveyors and I really don't want us to all find out first-hand." Twenty-some of the men fanned out in four-man squads, checking through the small number of tents left by the pioneers.

Besides the eerie wind stirring up the tent flaps and stretching the cloth, they found absolutely nothing. They found nothing but dust and echoes… until they took note of the surrounding terrain. "Men, does anyone else think those four roughly circular flat areas look a little weird?" Shepard asked.

"It does seem rather creepy, Lieutenant" Corporal Toombs spoke up. "Maybe once we all get back into the Pillar we can test our weapons on the circles…"

"Great idea, we've gotten all the evidence we could get with our scanners, it's time to do some aggressive investigating…"

* * *

Many, many light-years apart, Dr. Gustav Brackman and Miranda Lawson simultaneously facepalmed, or would have if they could have, as the Gauss Cannon shells crossed the hundred-meter distance between the camp and the Thresher Maw dens in a very small fraction of a second.

* * *

"What's that rumbling?" One marine asked when the ground began to shake and Shepard, who was driving, abruptly threw the tank in gear and began to run directly away from the odd circular terrain formations, the turret facing back to deal with the rumbling that seemed to be following them.

Suddenly the tank lurched sideways as a projectile slammed into one side and began to eat away at the structural fields of the vehicle, especially their weak points—the tracks, and the tank slowed down on that side.

The cannon started firing away at the first monstrosity, some thirty meters tall, that it set sights on, slamming a pair of high-velocity, high-explosive shells into the creature every 1.3 seconds. The first creature launched another blob of acid at the vehicle, which lurched out of the way, before it vanished underground again, the second creature kept firing at the tank as it moved and dodged. However, what the marines did NOT expect was for the gigantic armoured snake-like creature to pop up directly under the tank, tipping the 396-ton vehicle (which was the size of a house) backward, flipping it over cleverly and forcing the crew to bail out.

Ultra-Light Phasic Autoguns, Gauss Assault Rifles, Laser Battle Rifles, and Sonic Pulse Shotguns, opened up from the fifty Marines that had scrambled into the open. Rocket Launchers, Light Plasma Cannons, and Laser Autoguns were also brought out as heavy weapons. The massive worm-like creatures responded with volleys of acid and melee attacks, chewing up Marines and their weapons as though they were nothing. Electron Grenades found themselves in common use as those captured by the jaws of the creatures would pull the pins on all the grenades they had before being swallowed.

High explosives and electron destabilizations rent the armour plates and innards of many of the worms to ribbons, while Laser, Phasic, Gauss and Sonic weapons tore down others. The worms rent, melted, ate, and swiped at the Marines, who were doing their best to dodge, though it wasn't enough. By the end of the pitched battle, the Pillar Tank's wreckage had been melted down to an unrecognizable twisted hunk of metal, the Stinger's chin gun had actually overheated once (over 4000 shots would have to be fired for this to happen, and that was a long time of shooting…), and only one Marine remained standing. The one particular N7 Marine finally clamoured up into the hold of the Stinger, after enough of the worms had been taken down for the Stinger to safely approach (it had already lost one of its four thrusters pods to acid eating away at the engine intake grille…) and pick him up.

The gunship pilot threw all power to the engines in a panic and the Stinger Medium Gunship (T2) shot toward space and the frigate it had deployed from. The globs of acid following it eventually lost speed and fell away, back toward the surface of Akuze.

* * *

"Well, that's at least two survivors," Miranda wiped at her brow as she finally steered the T3 Combat Engineer to a safe location, carrying in the back an unconscious marine swiped away from the Thresher Maws just in time. She looked at the lucky man's dog tags, they read: Corporal Toombs, she didn't bother reading the rest, the words and numbers were blurred by acid anyways… "Too bad we couldn't get the message to them in time…"

* * *

_Rakhana, 26 November, 3866_

And so it was that John Shepard became known as the Sole Survivor of Akuze, the brass, especially Hackett, gave him some extra shore leave, and Hannah Shepard insisted they meet up so she could take care of him for a couple weeks to help him recover. _Being one of the Elite Four certainly had its perks…_ Hannah thought as the Orizaba came out of the space dock over Rakhana after a few minor tune-ups, until she got the message: "Elysium Under Attack By Batarian Fleet, Request Immediate Assistance, Quantum Storm In Area, Use Mass Effect FTL!" broadcast to all fleet elements near the Skyllian Verge.

She decided to quote a late twentieth-century film while she went through the mass relay to the nearest one to Elysium, still several hours of Mass Effect FTL away from the planet. The Orizaba had reached the relay three hours after receiving the announcement, so it would take seven hours to reach the planet. The quote she used was "In the words of my generation, UP, YOOOUUURS!" (Independence Day, 1996 film)

* * *

_Elysium, 26 November, 3866_

Once again, John Shepard found himself in the middle of what Seth-Thauum aka Uncle Seth called "some abysmally deep, freaky-ass shit". In this case, said freaky-ass shit was a gap blown in the makeshift wall put up by the civilians of Elysium across the main highway into their Capital City, currently under attack by a large Batarian fleet. Being a corporate colony, Elysium had few defences, trusting that any threat could be effectively countered by gating in commanders from the Coalition military outpost on the other side of the planet. They were dead wrong, the quantum storm stopped all chance of doing anything except flying in reinforcements, a risky prospect considering the number of Batarian ships in the air. Said ships were collectively holding position outside the city's shields, which had been tuned to annihilate all incoming large masses upon impact, if said mass is more than seventy meters above ground level.

Thus it came down to gruelling urban warfare in the suburbs. Thankfully, the civilian population had mostly pulled back into the city in time, and those that remained behind were veterans of past wars, who only wanted to see some peace. The best thing about being such a veteran was the vehicles neighbourhood armouries stocked. There were tracked, heavily armoured "trucks" which were more like tanks, featuring a Quad Light Laser Autogun turret with a single Electron Bolter. The LLA guns were effectively heavy machine guns, akin to the Tomcat but lighter, weaker, and more precise, the Electron Bolter, however, could throw a 50 damage point slug every two seconds, making it an effective anti-tank weapon. The net result was a light/medium tank of great versatility (the LLAs could also be used for anti-air duty) and decent armour strength, complete with shield and galleries for carried infantry to fire out of.

Bluntly put, the vehicles bore an extreme resemblance to a mobile house, complete with armour and personal shielding. The veterans put the vehicles to great use, strafing the Batarian advance repeatedly. However, something was about to change this stalemate that kept on draining Batarian blood without any human lives being lost…

With several mighty booms Disruptor Torpedoes cut off access to a section of the defence line for the massive vehicles, a sector where there was an opening in the wall for a major highway, flanked by short buildings and checkpoints. It would be here that John Shepard found himself stuck during the Siege of Elysium.

"Can you still fight?" John asked a civilian man clutching a Gauss Assault Rifle to his chest, his breathing coming in short gasps, a bandage around the stump of one leg which had been blown off by a Batarian grenade but sealed with medi-gel.

"Yes, Lieutenant."

"Good," he clapped the man around the shoulder "I'll hold the squints as long as I can, get the civilians out of here and take up defensive positions, if they overrun my position, it'll be up to all of you" he gestured at the five meagre civilian men and women who could handle weapons but were too hurt to move much, an Aeon, a Cybran, a UEF, a Seraphim and a Drell "To make sure they don't breach the city, CAN YOU DO THAT?" He roared, shaking his fist in the air in the intermission between Batarian attacks.

"YES, WE CAN!"The five wounded civilians… no, troopers, yelled back defiantly as they clutched their weapons tighter and prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice should it become necessary. All of them knew they could die here, on this day, but they also knew that never would it be said that they died helpless before the enemy. They would make sure that the fucking squints paid in blood for every nanometre of soil, no matter the cost. John looked between the five, before leading the men and women, human, Drell and Seraphim, still fit enough to fight up to the forward line, where they would hold the enemy for as long as they lived.

The five wounded troops, all with missing parts to some degree (mostly feet or legs, but some fingers and an arm too), looked around at one another, eyes of the three member species and all of the factions of the Coalition meeting, as one, they nodded and resumed their silent vigil. The Coalition's Elysium Colony had its final bulwark placed in the hands of a united group of civilians, male and female, of all its races and factions, a truly fitting last stand. According to later historians discussing the Skyllian Blitz as a whole, the motley crew would have made for a glorious stand, and indeed a vid was made about what would have happened had John Shepard not been there, it made the Coalition Oscars. The vid's most memorable quote was probably said by the female Cybran actress: "That was so Barack Obama."

Meanwhile, up at the front, another wave of Batarians came in "hold fire until I start shooting" was John's first order to the civilians along the ramshackle line of furniture, wreckage, and boards. In the scant hour or so the veterans had to prepare before the Batarians began to attack the city proper, they had already put up ceramic bathroom tiles, the small ones, sandwiched between layers of steel plate, along the barricade at critical points, a crude composite armour. John had helped, and now, after taking back the barricade from the Batarians who had overrun the position, was once again manning it, along with the few civilians still able to fight effectively.

Taking a moment to examine the troops as the Batarians slowly crept forward, he noted their nervous but determined expressions, typical of civilians caught up in this sort of situation. He watched their hands clutching the rifles he had handed out tightly, trembling slightly, and he knew that the Batarian attack was doomed, doomed by this motley crew of civilians who could fight and had volunteered to do so.

The first Batarian squad cautiously advanced into his kill zone, and the squad leader was promptly met with a Laser Battle Rifle bolt to the head, set on sniper mode, the bolts could do a lot of damage, and considering the nature of pirate/slaver gear… the Batarian's head, and helmet exploded like a grenade, splattering shrapnel over the others' shields. The Coalition barricade erupted in fire as the civilians opened up as one with their Gauss Assault Rifles, Sonic Pulse Shotguns, and Ultra-Light Phasic Autoguns. Bolts of brilliant light and phased plasma flew out toward the Batarians and cut them down in seconds, before they could even try to run for cover, such was the power of the Coalition small-arms. After all, said small-arms were designed with taking on Land Scouts in mind. Support Weapons were designed to take down Light Assault Bots, and Heavy Weapons were designed to take down Light Tanks or even Medium (T2) Assault Bots.

A Spirit Land Scout was ten meters long and eleven wide, and packed a 50mm Light Laser, by the standards of the other races, it was more or less a light tank. A Turian Landcruiser had similar structural integrity, not counting shields, and only five times the damage per second, and it was considered a medium tank in the Council Races. HOWEVER, with all the possible upgrades maxed out (and the cost multiplied to three times the original, at least in the case of the small machine) With all the possible upgrade enabled and built-in, the little vehicles (little by Coalition standards) could engage Turian Landcruisers one-on-one and WIN. The Crystalline Refractors doubled their firing rate; the Hardened Over-Shield provided them with a shield of 40 strength; Particulate Saturation further boosted firepower of the little laser to double its original hitting power. Self-repair subroutines gave the unit a regeneration of 1 Structural Field point per second, though if the shield was still up and the armour undamaged, this regeneration went to boost the shield's regeneration of 2 per second

* * *

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS HERE: READ IF YOU WANT TO AMUSE YOURSELF WITH MAGNITUDE OF COALITION UPGRADES/TURIAN INCOMPETENCE.

The match of the fully upgraded Spirit and the Turian Landcruiser is a close one. Mathematically, it came down to a stack of 23 HP, 40 Shield, 4 DPS (damage per second), and 1 regen per second (3 if you count the Hardened Over-Shield upgrade) against 20 HP, 100 shield, 5 DPS, and no regen. Thus was the match of fully upgraded Spirit Land Scout and standard Turian Landcruiser, assuming range is too great for secondary machine guns on the Landcruiser. It would take 29 seconds for the Spirit's advanced targeting systems to guide its weapon to annihilate the slow Turian tanks (first shot being at 0 seconds, 1 shot per second).

On the other hand, it would take the Turian tanks 18 seconds simply to wear down the shield (first shot at time 0 and firing once per 2 seconds) and deal a meagre 3 structural damage (the round having slowed down from shattering the shield), at Time 20 seconds, the Spirit would be reduced to 12 HP. At time 22 Seconds, 4 HP, however, the Shield would reboot once it had been broken, at a faster rate (4/sec in this case) than simple regen, so at Time 25 seconds the Spirit will be at 5 HP, 20 Shield. At Time 26 it would take another hit and be at 6 HP, 12 Shields, at Time 28 Seconds, 8 HP, 6 Shields, and at time 29 seconds the fight would end. Even if the Turians were to get in another shot, it would make no difference, as the Spirit would still stay hovering, at 8 HP and zero shields.

However, should the Turians also employ their coaxial machine guns at full capacity and volume of fire (though they would need to close in), the outcome could theoretically become very different. The one problem with the plan was how a Spirit could hover along at 100 m/s or 360 km/h, even backwards, and could move over water if it so chose. Essentially, the small-arms the coalition militia were armed with were anti-materiel rifles. Though they would pose no major threat to a fully upgraded… anything, the infantry weapons could still do major damage to non-upgraded units.

* * *

That being said, the weapons John had and his civilian crew had tore through the Batarians' shields and armour like they weren't even there. After the first wave passed on to the great beyond, John drew his ULPA and set its bipod up, ready to offer support fire should it become necessary. He was thinking about how pathetic the Batarian armour and shields were when he heard a low roar of an engine. His helmet's built-in sensor suite told him a vehicle was coming around the bend in the highway just over a kilometre away, and it wasn't a friendly. His ULPA began rattling off Phasic (partially phased plasma, enables greater target penetration without nearly as much cumbersome cooling or risk of overheat) rounds a second before the Batarian APC rounded the corner and ran fender-first into the first round he'd fired. His HUD and armour targeting tech helped greatly in predicting the movements of the APC, and it did not reach the barricade before the Batarians were forced to bail out of the rapidly disintegrating vehicle.

The squints dove behind what meagre cover the highway offered, mostly pieces of blasted concrete and rubble from the disruptor torpedo bombardment, and were methodically cut down. Sonic Pulse Shotguns were designated as such only because of the slow speed of their rounds, otherwise, they would have been classed as a support weapon. Thus they became the weapon of choice for blasting through the cover to the Batarians as soon as John figured it out, putting down his ULPA in favour of steadying his shots with his SPS, as over half the volunteers followed suit. The remaining volunteers had been designated riflemen and were to use LBRs (Laser Battle Rifles) to suppress the enemy unless the non-riflemen began to go down, which didn't seem to be happening anytime soon.

_Four hours later…_

John was actually beginning to get worried, where were the fleet elements that should have arrived? Almost every one of his civilians had been injured in one way or another, though the isolated structural fields and shields of the helmets prevented anyone from dying of headshot. Several of the civilians had taken bad shots to the upper torso, however thanks to the nature of the enemy munitions even major arteries could be quickly repaired with medi-gel placed in the right places by local quantum teleportation. Thankfully, this form of quantum travel was not disrupted by the quantum storm raging in the quantum realm, only the transportation of larger objects (more than about 1 kg) was disrupted.

At this point in time, the Batarian waves were growing bigger and bigger, and the Coalition line of civilians was getting more ragged, every man and woman, Human, Seraphim and Drell was in pain to some degree. Medi-gel did its work absurdly well, but it did not normally take away the pain, that was the job of either anaesthetics or military stim packs, and Shepard personally did not like carrying more than two of either of those. He'd never used and never had to use stims or painkillers, but there wasn't even enough on him for the colonists that still held onto their rifles and shotguns, manning the line with cold determination. He was the only one not yet hurt, thanks to his superior shields and armour, not to mention skills, but he couldn't afford the Batarians taking out his help…

He did the only thing he could do, draw attention to himself by manning a salient position in the barricade, firing his Ultra-Light Phasic Autogun, Laser Battle Rifle, Gauss Assault Rifle, and Sonic Pulse Shotgun into the masses of Batarians that encroached on the highway. His colonists laid down a withering field of fire, but he was the one who made most of the kills with quick, clean headshots. His arms were starting to get tired from four hours of incessant fighting, but the ETA for the nearest Coalition ship was still two hours away…

* * *

_Orbit over Elysium, 26 November, 3866_

"Alright, you Alien Assholes, I'M BAAAACK!" Shepard bellowed as her ship decanted from Mass Effect FTL, the Sonance promptly charging up and delivering a seventy-kiloton TNT equivalent gift to the largest Batarian ship, which was directly in front of the Battle Cruiser and had immediately attracted the attention of the Heavy Microwave Laser, Dual Plasma Beams and Triple Gauss Cannons. Suffice it to say that by the time the Sonance actually fired, two seconds after the Orizaba and her Hunter Squadron decanted, the Batarian ship was already near zero shields and taking damage. The four Heavy Cruisers pulled off similar Capital Strikes against the next four Batarian cruisers, in terms of size, while the Light Cruisers, Destroyers and Frigates set about methodically ripping the Batarian fleet to shreds.

The Battle of Elysium was the first ever engagement when Coalition Battle Cruisers had actually deployed their Heavy Microwave Lasers, Heavy Oblivion Cannons, Sonance Artillery, Phason Lasers and Plasma Accelerators at the same time. Hannah Shepard quickly realized that they could not focus fire, or it would be a case of extreme overkill. The two Heavy Oblivion Cannons together could take down a cruiser with a single salvo, and the two Plasma Accelerators could do the same. The Phason Lasers and HML only took seconds to burn through Batarian cruisers and frigates without breaking a sweat. The reactor readouts and such didn't show any serious drain on the ship's power supply, such was the power of the Quantum Resource Generator.

The Batarians had attacked the colony her son was on, the colony her son was spending SHORE LEAVE after his horrific experience on Akuze on, and for that, they would pay. Volleys of fire sprayed outward from every Coalition ship in her fleet while they nimbly dodged Batarian guns. Batarian ships were brewing up left, right and center while her own ships were either fast enough to dodge or tough enough to take the shots that did hit, cruisers and destroyers were in fact still quite nimble…

The Batarians on the ground, according to strategic reports, were packing up and fleeing to their ships, while she was routing the fleet. She sent two of her four Hunter Clutches after the escaping Batarian fleet, but some of the fucking squints still got away… Oh well, in war, it is difficult at best to completely eradicate an enemy army, so be it, now, if only Coalition Intel could have done a better job, this whole fiasco would never have happened.

Hannah Shepard did not care for the fact that on the Batarian end, it was much more obvious of a fiasco. Coalition HQ should have KNOWN to station fleets near new or young colonies during Quantum Storms, why did they not do it? And why the flying fuck did the bastards have to attack the colony her son was spending his shore leave on?

* * *

_Elysium, 29 November, 3866_

"And so, we award to Commander John Shepard the Star of Terra for his valiant leading of the defences on Elysium." Admiral Hackett announced proudly, putting the medal on the man he had long since recognized as his nephew. "Now, may we have a round of applause for all these brave men and women, Human, Seraphim and Drell, who stand before you on this day!" Hackett's voice was drowned out in applause and the flashes of camera drones.

"John's really grown up…" General Seth-Thauum said from his position on the other side of Hannah Shepard from James.

"I agree, and I couldn't be prouder of my brother…" James was wearing a broad grin. "By the way, mom, Coalition Intel has dug up some new stuff on the Batarians that attacked Elysium, it seems their primary base of operations is on a moon called Torfan…"

"Great, I'll take great pleasure in making them pay for every second they took from John's rest and relaxation" Her face twisted into a snarl "James, you've also been given leave to spend some time with your brother, use it well, while you boys relax, I have a job to do."

"Shore leave? Since when did I get cleared for leave?" James looked around at his mother, his eyebrows raised.

"Since you don't have any assignments for the next week or so, Hackett cleared you for some leave, duh." Hannah rolled her eyes at her son, being a member of the Elite Four really had its perks.

* * *

_Torfan, 30 November, 3866_

The Batarian fleet around Torfan were now all twisted hunks of burning metal, most of which were on the ground, and Hannah Shepard smiled vindictively. "You idiots want to try stonewalling? Not even Hackett or Williams managed to stonewall me, what makes you think you have a chance?" She'd learned from Hackett after the Seraphim War that the defence of Black Sun had been codenamed Operation: Stone Wall by the UEF, she'd, along with Williams, the Stonewalling expert of the Elite Four, gotten a good laugh at Hackett's expense.

She gated down, using Corvettes, Restorers and Geminis to cover her position, and quickly established a large base, using resource generation from the onboard Quantum Resource Generators (aka Paragons) of the Battle Cruiser and Escort Carrier. She built up a T3 base, and then started putting up strategic missile silos. She used all three human factions' strategic missile launchers as well as the Yolona Oss in her base.

The first hit of the big red nuke launching/superweapon-firing button in her ACU was for the Liberator Strategic Missile Silo, of the Cybran Nation. It was a matter of symbolism, in addition to the fact that, while the super-hardened electronics, programmed to resist such attacks, used by the Coalition could reboot after the EMP Nuke, the Batarian electronics were not really hardened at all. This was due to the fact that Nukes were rarely used in Council Space; dreadnoughts' main guns could usually do the job with a lot less fuss. The net result was the spontaneous frying of every computer within the Batarian fortress with one strike.

After the Liberator fired, a Stonager Strategic Missile Launcher, of the UEF followed suit. The name was also symbolic, reducing the Batarian resistance to, effectively, the Stone Age, inside their fortress (thankfully, for the Batarians, no one was stuck inside the elevators). Finally, she fired an Apocalypse Strategic Missile Launcher, the Aeon counterpart to the Liberator and Stonager. She had chosen not to use the Seraphim one because the name did not sound symbolic enough, so she'd just built a Yolona Oss and left it, with a missile ready, sitting there while she sent a legion of T3 Combat Engineers, escorted by Restorers, Athanahs and Loyalists, to simply _reclaim_ the Batarian base.

The Batarians, who had been sealed inside, their ventilation shafts melted down, instantly surrendered when the first reclamation beams reached them. Hannah Shepard didn't bother to execute the surrendering Batarians, instead merely imprisoning them and sending them off to the Coalition government. But she did not stop there, before she allowed the trucks to pass through the gate, she loaded all of them onto the underside clamps of corvettes, one row of trucks each, taking up half of each corvette's clamps. She made the prisoners witness the Yolona Oss utterly erasing what was left of the once-"proud" Batarian fortress, leaving behind only a glass crater at the top of the large highland the base had been situated on.

She would be known as the Forgiver of Torfan to all but the Batarians, many of whom termed her "The psychotic Cybran Bitch who loves nukes way too much." The Skyllian Blitz, as the Coalition had termed the Batarian conflict, was over. The Coalition had not officially gone to war with the Batarian government, which had blamed the mess on the syndicates, but animosity remained between humans and Batarians.

The Batarians had been looking to colonize the Skyllian Verge for a little over a century, and had repeatedly applied to the Council for rights, but now the chance had been taken away by the Coalition, who had simply come in and settled with only a mention of intent towards the Council. This was why many of the Batarians had been angered into launching the Blitz against an enemy they never truly understood, and this was why they got their asses kicked. In protest, the Batarians had abandoned their embassy on the Citadel only a week before the Blitz was launched. Though the Coalition would have been willing to negotiate with the Batarian government, the foolish attacks of the Blitz were the final nail in the coffin of Batarian colonization of the Skyllian Verge.

Hannah Shepard was reported to have had this comment on the Blitz: "Like every other campaign humanity, and now the Coalition, has fought since the start of the Quantum Age, besides the Infinite War and Seraphim War, it was short, sweet, and ended in a good hammering for our opponent."

* * *

A/N: Got tired of writing Shepard(s) with a bunch of nameless people… want to get to ME 1 fast…

VOTE ON PROFILE POLL FOR JAMES SHEPARD'S ENTRY TIME!

REVIEW! SUGGESTIONS WILL BE HEARD/ANSWERED!


	10. Eden Prime

A/N: One-village-idiot is, put politely, quite ingenious, and most certainly NOT an idiot. His questions will soon be answered…

I was kind of thinking James/Tali, but I can see the appeal in James/Miranda… though I wanted to punish Miranda for being an ice bitch. In fact I was considering James/Jack so Jack can have some stability in life before I even came close to thinking of Miranda. This issue is thus far undecided.

SupCom 2 Experimentals overpowered and labelled as Seraphim? I see a few issues with that, one, the experimentals are way too distinctly faction-styled. I think the Seraphim don't need any more experimentals… the Yathsou T3 Sub Hunter and Hauthuum T3 Battleship (which is also a Strategic Missile Platform) essentially fill in the Sea Experimental Role (4 Yathsous can kill an Atlantis torpedo-wise for a lower cost)… On land they have the Ythotha, which can only safely be beaten 1v1 by a Megalith (which costs a crapload more) on land, and in Air they have the Ahwassa, far better survivability than the other air experimentals (excluding the absurdly large turning radius…and the fact that T3 or T4 aka Experimental artillery can hit it while turning, easily.)

The other questions, as listed below, will be answered as the story progresses, I could tell you now, but I don't want to give spoilers, ruins the awe at Coalition tech…

"What are gas giants used for?"

"What about orbital defences?" (I think I partially addressed this when I talked about the attack on Palaven during the Turian War…)

"Why not transport nukes into enemy fleets?" (I can hear Wrex asking that...)

These will be answered as the story progresses, most likely within a few chapters or during the Reaper War (I will write a speculative Reaper War if ME 3 isn't out by the time I finish all the other projects I have planned, otherwise I will try to follow along, unless it is utterly ridiculous…)

I DON'T OWN MASS EFFECT OR ME 2, LITERALLY! I HAVE NEVER PLAYED EITHER GAME!

Do NOT try to get me for inaccurate dialogue, I'm writing off the Wiki, and besides, there will be some minor plot/character changes…

* * *

_Sol System, 30 May, 3868_

Chapter 10: Eden Prime

"All hands, prepare for Relay jump." A certain Jeff "Joker" Moreau's voice came over the loudspeakers as a 20-year old Commander John Shepard (Soldiers commonly enlisted around 16, and considering his experiences, heroics and N7 Marine status his rank was perfectly reasonable) navigated around the three other crewmen in the bridge and walked up beside Joker, looking out at the relay as they reached it and jumped.

"Well done, Mr. Moreau" Nihlus Kryik, the resident Turian spectre, nodded to the crippled pilot, before leaving the bridge.

"I hate him." Joker commented.

Lieutenant Commander Kaidan Alenko looked over at Joker, frowning "why? He just gave you a compliment…"

"Yeah, I wipe my ass without assistance, well done, I fly us through the Charon relay without grazing any of the asteroids between us and it, freaking fantastic."

"Uh, Joker, you do realize that with your Vrolik's Syndrome, you can't put your weight on your legs, so wiping your ass without assistance would in fact be a challenge to you…" Shepard said matter-of-factly, earning a glare from Joker before the man grinned.

"Good one, Commander. Then again you always have a good counter-joke…"

Captain Anderson spoke over the comm. "Update, Joker?"

"We've cleared the relay and the Turian's coming your way, Captain, he's heading for the Comm. room."

"I'm already here, can you ask Shepard to come down here?"

"No problem, Captain, I'm on my way." Shepard left the bridge of the _Normandy_, a new stealth corvette, equipped with Cybran stealth and cloaking technologies, incorporating some Turian design elements in a gesture of goodwill to the Hierarchy, which had not been all that happy with the occupation of 100 of their colonies and the fact that all the shipyards, military depots and docks in the 400 colonies overrun by the Coalition had been utterly scrapped. The Coalition had not inflicted any significant civilian casualties, but 40% of your territory suddenly being utterly military-outpost-free is not a good thing for any government…

Shepard made his way out of the CIC, exchanging a brief conversation with Navigator Pressly, and made his way down the long central hall of the Corvette, meeting Jenkins and Doctor Chakwas outside the comm. room. They were having a conversation, and he decided it was best not to intrude…

Jenkins sounded eager "I can't wait to see some action, wouldn't you agree, Doc?"

"I don't think so, the sort of action you crave usually leaves me patching up wounded soldiers, or running tests/treatments for STDs…" Chakwas and Jenkins shared a laugh at this as Shepard walked by, nodding to them.

"Hello, Commander Shepard, I was hoping you would arrive first, it'll give us a good chance to talk…"

"Well, we can always talk on Eden Prime, our destination, if we have to…" Shepard shrugged, while holding his Cybran Helmet under his arm. The Cybran, UEF, Aeon and Seraphim armour options all essentially resembled the corresponding ACU variants, though in fact the ACUs could build any faction structures and the differences were mainly cosmetic and in the form of upgrade options (for the ACU). N7's had the same armour as all the other Marines, but higher clearances for armour upgrade options, and were allowed to piece their armour together with other armours as they wished. John, and James, who was stationed elsewhere, both liked the Cybran Heavy, Aeon Medium, and UEF Light armours better than the other choices.

"Eden Prime… that's a pretty new colony, if I'm not wrong, and it's on the far eastern Cybran border… near the Skyllian Verge and Terminus Systems… how safe is it really?" Nihlus spoke.

Captain Anderson then walked in "Nihlus, we should tell the Commander what is really going on, this… mission… is far more than a simple shakedown run."

"What do you mean, Captain? Are we going to raid an Insurrectionist holdout? Bombard a few pirate bases?"

"A science team on Eden Prime discovered a Prothean Beacon recently, the Coalition has decided that it would be better to give it to the Council to further relations and so that everyone can study it. After all, our quantum tech is good enough that we don't need to have it, some of the other races need the knowledge to help them get by."

"So what is a Prothean Beacon? I've heard of the Protheans, but never of any beacons or anything like that…" Shepard asked Nihlus.

"Prothean beacons are rare and valued artefacts that contain information, though no one has yet been able to access one effectively. Here, I will transmit the data to your suit computers." Nihlus turned on his omni-tool and transmitted the data. Shepard's suit computer beeped, confirming reception of the Codex entry.

"Thank you, Spectre." Shepard nodded, starting to pull up the entry from his chest plate's holoprojector before Joker interrupted.

"Captain, we have a problem." A holo-screen popped up and showed a transmission from the Marines stationed on Eden Prime battling unseen enemies, apparently holding off the enemy without much trouble, however civilian casualties were mounting and the pinned-down marines were helpless to do anything much about it. A large ship showed up in the background.

"Well, this mission just got a whole lot more complicated…" Captain Anderson deadpanned as he watched the marines joke around while cutting down the enemy, firing over cover, using their gun cams to target, before the transmission cut out. He rewound the transmission to show the ship turning up and began examining it.

"As you humans say, Hallelujah, tell me something I don't know…" Nihlus said with a straight face. Shepard was looking between the two as if they had each grown another head, then the two laughed at his expression. "Well, Commander Shepard, it seems we'll be going groundside soon, get your men ready."

"Understood, sirs." John put his Cybran helmet, complete with flaring spikes on the sides, on, and marched out of the room, sealing his helmet as he went. "Jenkins, Alenko, with me!" He ordered curtly as he found the two talking in the mess hall. "Prepare to get tactical, marines! Jenkins, grab the ULPA and whatever else you choose, Alenko, make sure your L1 is tuned up and ready to go, and grab a GLMG and your choice." Shepard himself grabbed his brand-new LBR-2 Laser Battle Rifle, issued only to N7's so far but slated to replace all the LBR-1s, which had been a stopgap weapon, within the year, once experimentation was over with. "Alright, marines, get ready to get tactical… Jenkins, why'd you elect to use the UEF Light helmet instead of your usual UEF Medium?"

"The Medium was a bit too restrictive in terms of turn rate for me, sir, so I thought the Light, though not as durable, would suit me better." Jenkins said through his quantum communicator instead of the radio, as it delivered better quality with lower jamming susceptibility. Over short distances, you could operate the communicators in the eye wall of a quantum storm without difficulty, and "short" ranges translated into a tenth of a light-second…

"We've arrived, ground team prepare for deployment." Joker said, the ground team, already mounted up inside their Restorer AA Gunship, locked down their helmets and armour components, then held on as the gunship, some forty meters long and forty wide (twenty wide for the body and five floors tall inside, heavily armoured on all sides with a powerful structural field), disengaged from the bottom of the corvette.

"It looks like a war zone out there, Commander, be careful." Anderson said over the comm. "John, you and your squad are to head straight for the dig site and secure it. Spectre Kryik will disembark and provide recon support and Intel on the area from a distance."

"That's right, though I suspect this gunship alone would be able to rout the attackers here, believe me, I was on Shanxi, I've watched Restorers do a LOT of shit to the Turian Army, and by the way, I think we deserved it…" Nihlus said, patting the wall of the gunship (more like half-size-frigate) affectionately "By the way, I really enjoyed that time your Captain let me take this baby out for a spin, and before you guys break your helmets with your jaws gaping at me, yes, he did do that, thought it would be nice if the Spectre knew how to handle the shuttle." Nihlus looked down at the exit as its light shone green and stepped in "It's my stop here boys, see you later!" With that, Spectre Nihlus Kryik walked out of the Restorer's airlock once the large, 4000-ton gunship had touched down on the battered surface of Eden Prime.

"Is it just me hallucinating, or did we just meet a Turian with a proper sense of humour?" Jenkins rubbed his helmet's fake eye-slits, which glowed blue, theatrically with his fists.

"Uh, Jenkins, unless there's something you aren't telling us, such as you taking hallucinogens and giving them to the rest of us, I think we actually saw such a Turian…" Shepard said, banging the back of his helmet with a fist to make sure he wasn't dreaming.

They reached their drop point a moment later, and Kaidan was first out of the craft, doing a routine sweep of the surroundings with his Gauss Light Machine Gun (GLMG) before stating "Ship perimeter secure, Commander."

"Alright, let's move." Shepard said, leading the squad through the rubble toward the dig site, noting the random supply crate in the corner and beaming it up to the Normandy via the quantum teleporter in his armour synching with that in the Restorer, and the Restorer uplinking to the _Normandy_. Whatever it was could be analyzed later, the teleporter could screen out planted bombs anyways… Shepard moved left after picking up the crate, walking between the rubble and constantly scanning his surroundings. They approached an open field, perhaps a park?

Shepard stopped, raising a fist to tell the squad to stop, kneeling beside a large piece of concrete, levelling his LBR before motioning Jenkins forward. Jenkins dove behind the next piece of cover as several dozen oval hovering objects, each with an underslung gun, appeared out of nowhere and began firing on him. Shepard cut one down with each shot of his LBR, Kaidan firing away with his GLMG, two hits taking one down, cutting down five per second, while Jenkins opened fire with his ULPA, killing one with each hit, and they weren't easy to miss with the number. Jenkins' shield held out until the last dozen or so drones, then it flickered out, despite his use of cover, the drones cut into his left leg armour, cracking through the relatively thin ceramic, structural fields, and pneumatics with a dozen simultaneous shots, and blew the leg off at the knee.

Jenkins howled in defiance as he went down, three of the drones being cut down by his ULPA in the time it took for his armoured leg to collapse and for him to fall on his side. More shots singed his chest plate, which thankfully was considerably thicker and had its own under-layer of structural field, like the helmet, despite it being only medium-class armour. The rest of the drones went down in the next second, before they could breach Jenkins' chest plate, to a hail of gunfire from all three soldiers.

"Jenkins, is the medi-gel system on your armour working?" Shepard knelt by his fallen squad mate and checked his suit status readout. "We'll get the gunship to pick you up right now, you go back to the Normandy, and we'll have to clone a leg or give you a prosthetic."

"It's alright, Commander, I'll live, the anaesthetic's numbing the pain anyways." Jenkins said through gritted teeth as the roar of the Restorer's engines was heard overhead, the gunship landing in the field before them.

"That's good to hear, Alenko, help me get him to the gunship, he needs to go back to the Normandy ASAP and ideally to the nearest major station or Hunter Clutch's Heavy Cruiser." John lifted Jenkins by the shoulders while Kaidan picked up the legs, their armour helping them lift the man, who had locked his armour to help them move him. They put him in the gunship, sealed up the hatch, and sent a transmission to the Normandy, then they proceeded on their way to the dig site.

Not twenty meters up the field, a hail of Quad Light Laser fire from the rapidly departing gunship that carried their squad mate blew a series of large holes in the ground before them. "What the fuck was that?" Shepard shouted to Kaidan instinctively, with the smoke clouding their visual sensors. "Oh, never mind, the gunship just responded to a few stealthed units my sensors just picked up…" doubtlessly, they were the same drones the group had encountered before. "Come on, Kaidan, let's go over that hill and see what's waiting for us…"

"Commander Shepard, I've found something strange… a LOT of Coalition, human, civilian remains, as if the Geth… can you believe it, GETH! Gathered them for some purpose while the local Marines are pinned down…" Nihlus' voice came over the comm. as the two soldiers crested the hill, checking for enemies via gun cam first.

John noticed a crate to his left and picked it up, then moved behind a tree trunk as he cautiously advanced. One oval drone came around the tree and almost optic-to-optic and gun-to-gun with him, other than the height superiority of the Marine. It went down in a shower of sparks after two shots of his LBR, one into its gun and one into its hull. Alenko was disposing of two other drones with his GLMG, without difficulty, and Shepard helped with the last one, which Kaidan had thrown into the air with a Lift.

* * *

Ashley Williams pounded along the deserted path, pursued by a dozen of the enemy drones, cursing her luck; they could probably take her down before he could get all of them, considering how she was cut off from the rest of her unit, the Two-One-Second Marine Squadron. She took three hits despite her weaving through the trees, but her Aeon Heavy armour held off the enemy attacks without incident.

The first reaction to tripping over a ROCK of all things was her rolling to hit the ground on her back and bringing her Sonic Pulse Shotgun and Laser Pistol to bear on the enemies who were catching up. She mowed them down, blinking in surprise as she discovered their weapons to be a) short-range and b) weak.

Once she was done with that, she rolled to he left in the forest and noted the two Troopers (as the Marines called them) pulling a Cybran colonist over a tripod-like device, and then a large spike coming up and impaling the colonist. Suddenly, one of the troopers took note of her, probably because she had used a pink colour scheme instead of the standard Aeon armour's green, and it wasn't good forest camo. She dove behind the nearest available cover, a truck, and yanked out her GLMG, starting to fire on the advancing, dodging troopers, who seemed to have weak personal shields as she cut one down. The other one went down to a hail of laser and Phasic fire, her first thought was of reinforcements.

* * *

"Well, they were tougher than the things we've faced before…" John said, prodding one of the humanoid remains with an armoured toe before looking up at the female marine that had walked up in her Aeon Heavy armour.

"Hello, Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams, of the Two-One-Second, are you the reinforcements from HQ?" she cocked her head to one side.

"We were sent to secure the beacon and assist the colony in any way we are able, do you know what these… things are?"

"Geth, they haven't been seen outside the Perseus Veil in six hundred years, according to the files from the Council Races… a race of sentient machines created by the Quarians for labour, rebelled against their creators, and won the ensuing war. Sounds familiar, eh?"

"Like the Earth Empire and Cybran Nation story from history class… by the way, nice to meet you again, Ash."

Ashley Williams froze in place "John?" She whispered, almost to herself, then nearly bowed him over with a hug and a ruffle of the helmet "It's so great to see you again! How have you been? How's James doing?"

"Whoa, whoa, one thing at a time, we can talk about that sometime after the mission, my old friend, or should I say, older friend."

"Very funny, and very mature, mister, anyways, the dig site's only a little further up the road, let's get moving."

"Hold on, let me grab the crates and med-pack first." John checked his suit status as he did this, and then moved up the road to a series of rocks, where several waves of Drones and Troopers came at the trio. Kaidan, having set the UPLA up on a rock, helped mow down more than half the troopers, while Shepard's LBR-2 and Ashley's GLMG took care of the survivors and the more nimble drones.

"On our six! I got them!" Shepard announced as he spun around, unholstering his LP (Laser Pistol) and dual-wielding it with his LBR, which he propped up on a rock. He cut down three troopers and five drones, and then turned back after his short range omni sensor suite and radar told him he was done. The others were similarly finished their work, and the trio advanced into the dig site without further ado.

"Where did it go? It was here just moments ago…" Williams questioned, looking around cautiously.

"It probably got moved, even if it wasn't captured."

"Hmm… probably." Ashley hummed in agreement.

"Hey look, another crate!" This comment by John caused Ashley to have a minor flashback to when she and the Shepard twins were five and in a toy store.

"There's a change in plans, commander, I'm going ahead to investigate a small spaceport and I'll meet up with you there." Nihlus said over the radio.

"Alright, Spectre, go ahead, did you remember the shield neckband I gave you? Use it, I have a bad feeling about this day…"

"Alright, Shepard, if you say so." The line went dead as Shepard walked toward the science camp near the dig site.

"The scientists must have left something…" he said, looking around.

As they approached the site, Kaidan made a comment "It is the perfect place for an ambush, keep your guard up."

Williams looked at him "Should I be saying Hallelujah right now?" Suddenly, there was a low rumble as one of the spikes near them, where the scientists were impaled, lowered into the ground and a scientist, his body glowing with blue circuitry, rose from the ground and lumbered toward the squad. Another corpse rose in similar fashion, but a third remained on the ground, apparently having failed in its conversion. "What did the Geth do to them?" She exclaimed, alarmed. Shepard and Kaidan had already opened fire on the two advancing zombie-like creatures, blowing them to pieces in a few hits.

The last husk seemed to be visibly struggling, its circuitry slowly retracting and its skin starting to appear normal again, the blue lines turning orange as it shook on the ground. Less than a minute later, a Cybran scientist, definitely still alive, was lying on the ground, dazed and breathing hard, but apparently not harmed much. "Where… where am I?"

"You're safe now, we're Marines and we've come to rescue you…" Shepard told the very ill woman, who violently threw up onto the ground once she had risen to her hands and knees.

"Thanks, has the Fleet arrived yet?" The scientists asked, still very weak.

"No, but we'll find you a safehouse… somewhere." Shepard scurried around the dig site, finding several crates and upgrade packs before locating a locked door on the second shack, breaking in using his suit computer and finding two scientists. Apparently, the beacon had been moved to the starport earlier in the day, Shepard left the Cybran scientist with the two and called the Normandy, via Quantum Communications, to pick the three up.

As the three rounded a corner in the road, a massive ship rose from the other end of the settlement, awing the three soldiers for a moment before they engaged the few husks and Geth Troopers guarding the exterior of the spaceport building. The enemies were quickly cut down as the three opened up with their assortment of weapons. Shepard gathered some more loot along the way, including three farmers holed up in a building. He'd gotten all the info he wanted from them and was about to leave when surprisingly one spoke.

"Hey Cole, these guys saved our asses, let's give them something in return, man, like that stuff you smuggle…"

"You're a smuggler?" Williams arched an eyebrow under her helmet, her helmet lighting reflecting the move.

"Yeah, but it's just some little stuff, like this piece of tech I have for your gauss ammunition…" The man tapped his Omni-tool and transferred the files.

"Do you have anything else that'll help us take your homeland back?" John asked, his interest having been piqued by the prospect of new tech.

"Well, there's this…" He uploaded a schematic for a level 1 enhanced cooling system for laser weapons to the trio.

"What's the name of your contact?" Ashley inquired.

"I can't tell you…" Cole trailed off.

"Come on, if you tell us, we'll put in a good word if you get found by the law enforcement agencies… And I do mean 'if', we won't tell anyone unless you try something stupid in the future like try to ship explosives for use against Coalition government buildings." John said, looking at the man gently but with a hint of steel.

"Okay, okay, the man's name is Powell, you happy? Can you call in your evac shuttle now? This place is getting scarier by the minute…"

"Alright, we'll call in evac for you, it'll take a bit to arrive, so just stay here, will ya?" Said evac would consist of the second Restorer the Corvette brought with it… the first would be used for the squad, as Shepard felt something would go wrong very, very soon.

* * *

Nihlus approached the spaceport cautiously, ducking behind a piece of cover before using the gun cam Shepard had given him to peer over the shipping crate. It had helped him greatly already, letting him conserve ammo against the many dozens of Geth units he had encountered thus far. He spotted another Turian, his old friend, Saren Arterius.

"Saren?" Nihlus stood up and walked toward Saren, who had swung his rifle in the direction of the sound before relaxing "What are you doing on Eden Prime? Did the Council send you?"

"I was ordered to come and assist in your mission, so, where's the humans you were gonna come with?" Saren answered, Nihlus turned around for a moment, then turned back.

"Guess they aren't here yet. How's life been, old friend?"

"Fine, what do you think of this whole Geth mess?" Saren was struggling not to raise his pistol at Nihlus, but he was slowly failing as the gun came up, level with the back of his friend's head. He tried to say a warning, but none came from his mouth…

"Well, they haven't been outside the Perseus Veil in six hundred years and suddenly they make a re-emergence? Kinda sketchy…" Nihlus's helmet informed him of three pistol rounds bouncing off his shield emitter neckband before he heard the three bangs, he whipped around toward Saren in a crouch under the next burst and was about to club the other Spectre with his assault rifle when he noted Saren's twitching, trembling hands and pained expression.

"Nihlus, it's controlling me. I can't… stop… it, it's too… late… for me, old… friend, kill… me! Shoot me, now!" Nihlus hesitated for a moment, and Saren's eyes went blank and lifeless as he stopped struggling with himself, smashing the pistol into Nihlus's head, damaging only the shield, before throwing down a grenade and jumping into a monorail car, which sped off. Nihlus dove out of the Grenade's lethal radius, but was still peppered by fragments of metal, which bounced off his just-rebooted shields, and the now nearly-depleted head shield.

Shepard ran up as Nihlus stared off into the distance at the rapidly retreating monorail car. "Nihlus, we heard gunshots, do you need a med pack? I've just found one…"

"No, the situation is far worse than that." Nihlus said, glancing at the three humans, who had holstered their weapons. "Saren, another Spectre, was here. Something… controlled him, he tried to shoot me in the back of the head, but he was fighting the control, whatever it was…"

"Hey, what's that? Get out here with your hands up and unarmed, or we start shooting!" Ashley suddenly yelled at a pile of crates, drawing her pistol while everyone else did likewise, Kaidan covering the group's six as the other three pointed their guns at the crates.

"I'm unarmed! I'm just a dockworker!" A man came out from behind the crates, wearing simple, working clothes, his hands held high in the air.

"How did you survive?"

"I was taking a nap behind the crates when I had to go take a piss, and the idiots didn't put any toilets up, I can tell you that… that's when I saw the attackers, so I stayed behind the crates and got away… Name's Powell, by the way."

"You survived through sheer laziness? What is the world coming to?" Ashley threw her arms up in exasperation.

John stepped forward and questioned the man, noting his slightly different answers compated to Cole and the farmers, until he mentioned the smuggling ring. "It doesn't matter anymore, it's gone now…" Powell said, slumping his shoulders.

"Why, how does it not matter anymore?" John pressed the man for details.

"No one really misses a few pieces from the military orders…" The man said, still looking down at the ground.

"Why I should melee you over the head with my GLMG for that statement mister. That is so not true, if you value your balls, shut the flying fuck up you motherfucker!" John was under the impression that any angrier and Ashley would blow up, literally, as she shoved her Sonic Pulse Shotgun into the man's crotch.

"Ash, let him go, Mr. Powell, if you have any of the smuggled goods on you right now, you had better hand them over, or we're going to see nothing…" He pointed at Ashley with his thumb, over his shoulder, with a vicious grin.

"Alright, alright, here, I only have a few electron grenades left, take them! Take them!" Powell panicked, handing over the grenades without a fuss, although he did have trembling hands.

"Thanks, Powell, do you have anything else that can help us take back your homeland?" Shepard said after distributing and pocketing the grenades.

"I have a schematic for high explosive gauss ammo, I'll upload it to you right now, don't hurt me!" The man squealed, causing Ashley to snort derisively, doubting his manhood.

"Thanks, Powell, evac's that way" Shepard jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Get to the dig site and a Restorer will pick you up. Good luck." The man took off with a comical cloud of dust trailing behind him, such was his speed, the squad laughed before proceeding.

* * *

"Does anyone else think this is totally monotonous?" Nihlus deadpanned.

"Yeah…" Ashley was yawning widely from boredom. Kaidan said nothing as he was checking his e-mail. Shepard was reading the Codex in his suit computer. They were once again seated inside their Restorer, which had thoroughly cleared out the train station with precision light laser fire, one gun firing at a time, as opposed to the original quad-linked nature of the guns. Now it was speeding along toward the spaceport, where Saren's Geth forces likely were.

In other words, the four were collectively bored shitless.

* * *

"Arm the nuke, destroy the entire colony, leave no evidence we were here." Saren ordered before he turned to and activated the Prothean Beacon.

* * *

The Restorer Gunship came to a landing a few minutes later, after thoroughly strafing all visible Geth without damaging the structural integrity of the spaceport "Well, here's our stop, we've discovered an armed nuclear device, we need to disable four security consoles in five minutes or it will go off."

The four-man team relied on brutal firepower, powerful shields, Biotics and Tech abilities to carve their way to the nearest console, which was disabled without delay. The crew then boiled upstairs and disabled two more consoles, laying down massed fire, Kaidan having passed his GLMG on to Nihlus to increase his firepower. Every Geth they met was cut down without breaking a sweat. Finally, it was time for the last console, which was guarded by husks and many, many Geth Troopers. Electron Grenades proved brutally effective against the creatures and robots, tearing them to scrap without further ado. Shepard raided the whole area for any available loot before he finally decided to ask Ashley to take a closer look at the tall stick-like thing they called a Prothean Beacon.

"So, John, what do you think of this whole mess with those… husk things?" Kaidan asked casually while Ashley walked toward the beacon and walked around it, inspecting it before stepping closer.

"What… John! Help me!" Ashley had been lifted above the ground by a force from the beacon, despite the weight of her Aeon Heavy Armour. John grabbed her by the shoulders and threw her aside, being caught up in the field himself.

Images broke into his head, flashing through his mind's eye, glorious towering buildings of a great civilization, the appearance of hundreds of black, squid-like ships in the skies, and then flashed of destruction, death and assimilation. Once the recording had finished, Shepard blacked out, the last thing he heard was Kaidan saying "Don't touch John, it's too dangerous."

The beacon exploded, pieces glancing off the four's shields as John was hurled back at high speed, crashing helmet-first into a railing before coming to a stop.

"John, JOHN! WAKE UP!" Ashley was checking his suit status and health monitors frantically, while firing up her armour's first aid program, he seemed… more or less fine, physically. Kaidan and Nihlus helped her pick him up and stow him into the Restorer

* * *

"Ugh…" John Shepard groaned as he woke up with a headache.

"John! You're alright! I mean, Commander Shepard…" Ashley trailed off as he wagged a finger at her.

"Ash, we've been on first name terms since we were, what, able to speak? I don't go for that formal nonsense unless it's in the presence of asinine superiors, which Anderson sure isn't."

"Ah, you're awake Commander, everything normal to you? No weird sensory input? No problems with your twined AI?"

"No, I feel more or less fine, except for a little headache…"

"That's to be expected, the beacon pulled you in and off the ground somehow,, then after a while it exploded in your face, you hit a rather strong railing helmet-first, don't worry, there's no concussion, but there are some odd beta waves in your brain."

"See, Ashley, I'm completely fine, not even a concussion!"

"Yes, well, odd beta waves, doesn't that sound scary?" Ashley seemed quite worried "By the way, sorry you had to save me, John."

"I would have done it any day, without hesitation; after all, you're my oldest friend, not counting 'scruffy-cute' James…" John cracked a wide grin as Ashley blushed, and then he comically rubbed his eyes "Ashley? You're blushing? Black Sun must have fired again!" (The newest rendition of "the world is ending") he threw up his arms to exaggerate.

"Well, I'll leave you two to your bantering… oh, Captain Anderson, are you here for your check-up?" Chakwas suddenly noticed Anderson at the door, facepalming at the banter the two Marines were sharing. Nihlus was lying in the next bed, out like a light, if he wasn't, Anderson suspected he'd have done the same

"I'd like a word alone with the Commander, Doctor" Anderson walked in once Ashley had left "Are you alright Shepard?"

"Yes, Sir, perfectly fit for duty."

"That's good to hear, though I must say that using the wrong airlock on the Restorer Gunship must be quite painful… especially for a Turian." Indeed, said Turian had found out the hard way that there were six different airlocks on a Restorer Gunship due to its sheer height and five decks. He had more or less walked out the wrong airlock after using the bathroom onboard and fallen three floors to the deck, since no catwalk had been extended to that particular airlock… He would have been fine if he had not banged his head on the railing of the catwalk he landed on (incidentally, he'd fallen there right after Ashley had cleared the area). "Tell Joker it's time to bring the ship into dock, I gotta talk with Chakwas about our resident Spectre."

"Understood sir." John nodded, then got up from his bed and left the med bay, heading for the bridge, finding Joker at his usual place with Ashley and Kaidan standing next to him, looking out at the field of stars and the flower-like object that was the Citadel "Joker, we have clearance to land now. Bring the ship in to dock." He laid his hand on the crippled helmsman's shoulder as Joker went through the motions.

* * *

The Normandy flew past several of the Turian cruisers stationed at the Citadel slowly (relatively), entering the enclosure that was the massive station and sighting the Asari Dreadnought _Destiny Ascension_, docked on the Presidium Ring of the Citadel. Its four secondary mass accelerators, each 1 km long prominently showed in its arms, and its main axial gun, 1.2 km long, opened into a barrel at the front of the ship. The graceful curves of the vessel were dotted by anti-fighter guns and smaller weapons designed to deal with any wolf pack frigates that got close.

"Nice tub, but it couldn't deal with one of our Battle Cruisers if we got in close, which the BCs are able to do with their shield power." Joker commented.

"Joker, I doubt it's smart to say that about a ship seven times our length… and probably well over five hundred times our mass." Kaidan deadpanned.

"Yeah, you're probably right… anyways, we've been cleared to land in Dock 422, get ready to disembark, ground team!"

"Alright, see you later, Joker."

* * *

A/N: And so, it begins… the Mass effect storyline… Hope you like... Can't wait for Therum...

REVIEWS ARE WELCOME! POLL ON PROFILE (About James Shepard aka John's twin brother)! VOTE NOW!


	11. Expose Saren

A/N: All starships of the Coalition of Species have specification that can be found in Chapter 1: The Road To War, except Battle Cruisers, which are in Chapter 8: A Sovereign Awakes.

About the various armour styles, in case I wasn't clear enough in the last chapter, I will go over the four main armour types in the Coalition Military.

In the Original Supreme Commander, when you play the intro videos for Cybran and Aeon campaigns, there are two suits shown for the ACU pilots. These suits are essentially the medium and light armours for the two factions (Aeon Light, Cybran Medium). The Medium Aeon looks like Thalia Kael's armour from SupCom 2, with the shoulder pauldrons and additional armour padding. The Heavy Aeon has a completely enclosed helmet, more bulk in the plating, and a heavier shield, though it is less manoeuvrable. The Aeon series of armours favour specialization, able to easily customize toward a particular branch, be it Combat, Tech or Biotics, and surpass the others at the chosen branch somehow. However, it is difficult to suit a jack-of-all-trades.

The Light Cybran has a visor on the helmet and less shoulder plating, but a better tactical cloak (lasts much longer). The Heavy Cybran is a bulked-up version of the Medium and includes two back spikes that resemble the Cybran ACU's (SupCom 1/FA Cybran ACU). Note that the Heavy Cybran can carry 1 extra Heavy Weapon compared to the other heavy armours (It can carry 3, the others carry 2, mediums and lights carry at most 1). This armour is ideal for the jack-of-all-trades, as it can evenly advance Tech, Biotic and Combat abilities.

The UEF Armours resemble the UEF ACU. The Light has a visor and offers the most flexibility of the endurance-oriented armours of the faction. The Medium has shoulder pauldrons, a thicker chest plate, hip armour plates, and slightly better shields. The Heavy has a sunken-in helmet (like the SupCom 2 UEF ACU) with shoulder-mounted shield field emitters. This whole line has heavier shielding than the other corresponding armours and more protection. The UEF Heavy is the only armour able to Hunker, and thus is the only one able to survive overwhelming attacks such as Geth Siege Pulses with shields down.

The Seraphim Armours have leg joints able to be configured in either direction, though Seraphim, like Humans, Turians, Asari, Drell, Krogan, Quarians, etc. have their knees bend forward (foot goes back). The Seraphim Light bears a resemblance to an Ilshavoh Assault Bot with a diamond-shaped torso piece (including visor and helmet which can rotate), and two lightly armoured arms. The medium bears greater arm and leg armour, and the Heavy has tall arm pauldrons and a hood-like structure for the head. This hood is similar to Krogan armours and thus has become very popular among the few Krogan who joined up with the Coalition's forces as Marines. The arm plate towers are the housing units for the weapons, especially heavy weapons, when compacted, so there is space for a Restoration Field, unique to Seraphim Heavy Armour, on the back. This field is able to heal friendly organics as well as, when turned to the setting, repair vehicles, albeit slowly (the Aeon armour if fully Tech-specialized is much faster at healing and repairs, but worse at other areas).

Hope that satisfies your curiosity as to what exactly the armours look like and what the differences are.

To one-village-idiot, I do follow To Survive: Alliances, it is very good. The Miranda issue… you'll see when we get there, let me get there first…

I HAVE NEVER PLAYED EITHER OF THE GAMES, DO NOT TRY TO TELL ME THE DIALOGUE IS INCONSISTENT WITH THE GAMES! (though if you think there's too little, too much or whatever, feel free to comment)

* * *

Chapter 11: Expose Saren

"This attack cannot go unanswered! The Coalition demands action against Spectre Saren!" Ambassador Udina was supremely irritated at the sheer… mulishness of the three Councilors. He was busy wondering why the flying fuck Coalition High Command had chosen HIM out of all people to deal with these asses when the Turian cut him off.

"Everything will be determined at the hearing, Ambassador, now please; we must attend to other matters…" Councillor Velarn was experiencing a distinct heady rush of pleasure at getting this human annoyed, perhaps because he represented the government that had brought his sister's wrath upon his head. She had been on his case ever since he left her husband to accidentally start a war and get himself killed; the idiotic admiral… then he cut the hologram.

Udina breathed deeply before turning to Anderson "Captain Anderson! It is good to see you, though I must say I don't like how you brought half the crew…"

"What are the council doing about Saren?"

"Not a thing, not a flying fuck of a thing. They insist on a hearing, with Saren's Spectre status, by the time we get a hearing, any real proof or witnesses will be long gone, probably." The Ambassador was scowling more widely than John, Anderson or Kaidan had thought physically possible. Ashley was busy wondering if the man was causing himself pain on purpose by doing that. "I need to go get the stuff we have ready, Commander Shepard, meet me at the Citadel Tower, Top Level, see you there." The politician nodded at John before stalking off. "You will have clearance to get in."

"That's why I hate politicians…" Shepard said, glaring after the retreating back of the Ambassador.

"So say we all, Commander, So Say We All…" Anderson said, sighing.

"Since the ass didn't specify a time for the meeting I'm gonna take a walk around and let him fret over it, should be fun… By the way, how are Jenkins and that Cybran Scientist?" Shepard asked.

"Fine, the scientist is completely normal other than the fact that the spike thing left her with a prosthetic heart, the Cybran circuitry began overpowering the Geth stuff from the head, so the Geth stuff had a chance to build the prosthetic heart before the Cybran circuits overwhelmed it. Jenkins is waiting for them to clone him a new leg, he's gonna be stationed on desk jobs for the next six months or so for rehab, so he'll be transferred…"

* * *

"Ah, well, I got a bunch of codex entries out of that walk; along with a project for the time off between the bits and pieces of this whole mess…" John had recorded the side assignment as Citadel: Xeltan's Complaint, apparently something about the Asari Consort… before proceeding to get a crap load of codex entries on many of the species of the Council Races, learn a lot of stuff about the Citadel Station, and ideally, greatly irritate Udina. As of present, all three members of the _Normandy_'s Ground Team were standing in the hideously slow device known only as the Presidium Elevator (Permanent Trademark of Citadel Council).

"So, how do you think the meeting will go?" Ashley broke the monotony of the long, long, LONG elevator ride.

"I don't think the Council's gonna respect the Coalition's request for Saren to be removed as a Spectre." Kaidan replied.

"I wouldn't be so sure; I think we can persuade them… somehow, though the universal constant for all politicians that did not start off as military men seems to be their asinine attitudes." Shepard answered as the elevator finally reached its destination with a ding and the doors opened. "Well, We're here, let's get moving."

* * *

Garrus Vakarian was at best mildly irritated by Saren's obstinate acts and at worst inclined to throttle his boss, Executor Pallin, for not letting him have more time to investigate into the Spectre's actions. "Come on, Executor, I only need a little more time, there's something just… wrong with Saren, I can feel it…"

"Garrus, I respect your skills as a detective, but you've already had enough time, we need you to do something else instead of this obsession with Saren…" Executor Pallin sounded annoyed, at Garrus, for "wasting" so much time, and before Garrus could reply he left, leaving a fuming Detective Vakarian behind.

Turning around, Garrus spotted an entourage of three humans. He cocked his head to one side, humans were rarely seen on the Citadel, only the desperate ran away from the near-paradise created by their quantum technology, where no one ever went hungry or cold or very ill unless it was of their own will, and where crime was cracked down on faster than a dreadnought slug. Then he noted the condition of the armour, these were not mercenaries, probably Coalition Military, but those were even less common on the Citadel and in Council Space… "Greetings, I am Detective Garrus Vakarian, C-Sec, are you here about the Saren business?" That was the only plausible reason human military, especially Marines, could be present at the moment on the Citadel, if war had somehow broken out, they would have used ACUs and gate onto the Wards.

"Yeah, what were you arguing with Executor Pallin about?"

Garrus was mildly surprised that this human would know Executor Pallin's name "It's my investigation into Saren, everything he breathes on is classified, but I feel something has to be happening with him… something serious."

"Why were you investigating Saren? I don't think he did anything wrong before Eden Prime, right?" Shepard was genuinely confused, if Garrus' Detective's eye was right, which it usually was (in this case, it in fact was right, but he didn't _know_ that).

"Saren's a shame to all Turians with the way he uses his Spectre's powers…" Garrus replied to the human, revealing nothing while still giving a reply.

"Well, Detective Vakarian, I'm headed to meet the council for Saren's trial. Good luck in your investigation, don't give up the fight. I'm Commander Shepard; it was nice talking to you, I hope we meet again." Shepard extended his hand and Garrus shook it, then the three humans continued on their way down the hall, leaving Garrus to take the elevator back to the Presidium.

* * *

A reddish hologram of Saren stood to the Council's right, the Petitioner's left as Shepard and Anderson joined Udina, who was busy trying to persuade the Council as to Saren's guilt. The Asari Councillor was speaking at the moment "The Geth attack on Eden Prime is of some concern; however Saren's involvement in the affair is to be frank quite questionable."

"Yes, tell that to Spectre Nihlus, who's currently lying unconscious in the Normandy's med bay." Shepard stated calmly, secretly regretting having disabled all the helmet and gun cam recording abilities because of the black ops nature of the mission. "Saren tried, and failed, to kill him with three shots to the back of the head!"

"Nihlus is a fellow Spectre and my closest friend, why would I want to kill him?"

"He said that you looked like you were controlled by something, something beyond your power."

"So says the guy who screwed up the mission I took him along on, are you sure you're not still bitter over that? Or have you been deluded? Since when did Nihlus start taking narcotics?"

"We have witnesses, Saren, a dockworker named Powell who survived and saw Saren issuing orders."

"Ah yes, this same Powell is also reported for, hmm, let's see, smuggling. Do you really expect his testimony to be reliable?" Anderson was wondering if he could get away with ripping Armin's head off, the damned frog… no, that wasn't politically correct, SALARIAN… was probably the most obstinate ass in his entire species at the rate that he was making an ass of himself.

Anderson started "Also, Commander Shepard received a vision from the Prothean Beacon…"

Saren facepalmed "Am I really expected to defend myself from dreams? How would I go about doing that?"

"I agree, visions and hallucinations have no place in this trial." Councillor Velarn spoke up first, the Councillors shred a look.

"There isn't enough evidence to justify dismissing Saren Arterius from the Spectres, this meeting of the Council is hereby adjourned." Tevos did have a bit of a feeling that something was there, but there just wasn't enough evidence, so she shrugged the feeling off.

The Council Members left their podium, leaving a very annoyed group of humans "It was a mistake to bring you into this, Anderson, with your history with Saren, I fear the Council has got it into their heads that you are merely attempting revenge…"

"There's no time for that, Ambassador, what should we do next?" John was by this time resolute in his decision to bring down Saren, the asinine attitude of the Council helped his decision greatly.

"As a Spectre, Saren's almost untouchable, but I have a couple contacts that might come in handy. Harkin, a C-Sec Officer, would be a good source of info, you can find him down in Chora's Den."

"Ambassador Udina, Harkin was suspended for drinking on duty; I don't think he'd be very reliable as an information source, I recommend Barla Von, a reasonably friendly Volus who might have some good actual Intel."

"Alright, Anderson, I'll go see this Barla Von first before I go to Chora's Den for Harkin."

* * *

"Hey, what's that guy doing?" Ashley gestured toward a Salarian who was scanning one of the insectoid critters that scuttled around the Citadel.

"Dunno, let's go talk to him… hello, there, what are you doing?" John asked the busy Salarian.

"Am scanning the Keepers, no one has yet investigated these strange caretakers of the Citadel, am concerned that we do not know enough about the Citadel and are too reliant on Keepers." John was wondering if the guy needed to breathe, considering his rapid speech in one breath.

"Alright, can I help out?"

* * *

"Another side assignment… I almost feel like a character from an RPG game… DING, You have gained enough experience to level up!" John said sarcastically once they'd reached the bank next to the Emporium, in the financial district across the bridge from the Presidium, in Zakera Ward.

"I know, this does feel like an RPG, but hey, aren't those supposed to be based on real life?" Ashley shrugged at John's comment.

"Well, we're here." The trio walked into the bank and immediately their HUDs labelled Barla Von as the Volus standing near them. John made another comment as they walked over to the Volus "This is so much like a RPG it's not even funny, I mean, he just has to be in such an obvious place…"

"Would you like to take a week trying to find a guy?" Kaidan deadpanned, earning a glare before John started talking to Barla Von.

"Are you Barla Von?"

"Yes, Earth-clan, what do you want?" the short, fat environmentally suited Volus said, making rather loud breathing noises as he spoke.

"Do you have any information on Saren Arterius?"

"Hmm, Spectre Saren, sensitive information, it would normally cost you a small fortune, however the Shadow Broker has ordered that any information on Saren be given away freely…"

"Why would he do so?"

"Saren had a deal with and betrayed the Shadow Broker, not a good move, the Shadow Broker is very angry with him and has ordered all us agents to release information on him freely in retribution."

"Hmm, that's good information; do you know anywhere where we can get a lead against Saren?"

"Saren conned a former agent of the Shadow Broker into working for him, his name is Fist and he runs Chora's Den. The Shadow Broker has hired a Krogan mercenary to deal with him." Barla Von said, shrugging his shoulders "That's all I got for you unless you have more money, by the way, drop by C-Sec Academy first, they may have something useful there."

"Thank you, Barla Von, may you prosper in all your future endeavours."

"Good luck, Earth-clan."

* * *

"Wrex, you've been accused of making threats against Fist, the owner of Chora's Den in Zakera Ward. You should stay away from Fist… for your good and his." The annoying Turian C-Sec officer's voice grated on Wrex's ears.

The Krogan Battlemaster glared at the Turian and bared his teeth, grinning. "I _will_ kill Fist." The idiotic Turian threw his arms up in exasperation and left, along with his partner. Wrex' sensitive nose, now that his nostrils were fully opened, picked up a new scent, he turned and noticed an entourage of three humans entering the Academy. He had not worked with or against humans all that much in the past, considering they were still quite new to the galactic community, first Contact being around two years ago. However, he had heard from some of his old friends of the treatment they received in the Coalition of Species and its Marine contingent, they were very, very tolerant and generally friendly unless you irritated them. The only complaint any Krogan had ever had about the humans, Seraphim, or Drell was the fact that they didn't allow their weapons and armour outside their borders, and all attempts at smuggling, even masterminded by a Cybran, had failed. Wrex liked the idea of using some of the human weapons and armours… "Hello, human, what's your name?"

"Commander Shepard, I'm after Fist, are you the Krogan mercenary the Shadow Broker hired?" The human responded, Wrex was surprised that this human would know that, but he did not show it.

"Yes, I am Urdnot Wrex if you are after Fist, we can reach an agreement… what do you say to a joint mission?"

"I'm after him for his information, not to kill him. How about this deal: I get the information I want, then you get him once I'm through."

"That is an acceptable deal." Wrex was secretly eager to see the human weapons in action. He had never seen them work because the Coalition Marines rarely left their territory and when weapons were captured or stolen by unauthorized users, they would self-destruct after a time unless returned to its rightful user. New and interesting ways of killing things were always nice to see, and maybe use… "There is a Turian who is also going after Fist, he's often seen at Dr. Michel's Med Clinic in Zakera Ward. I say we should go grab him first, before we go Fist-hunting."

"Good idea, now let's get this Turian." They piled into a Citadel Public Transport vehicle, which was slightly cramped with four armoured individuals, one a Krogan. "I'm authorized to release firearms to allies, so, Wrex, here's a little something for your help, please return it after the mission duration, or it may blow up… I don't have clearance to release control for more than about five hours at a time… yet. Admirals can release the weapons to certain individuals indefinitely, however if others handle it for too long, the weapons will self-destruct…" This human was quite generous, handing Wrex a small weapon that unfolded to for a pistol-type weapon, with two barrels, one above the grip and one under the grip (looks like a Covenant Plasma Sword from Halo without the glow and much shorter prong-like structures, the barrels) "It's a LSMG, Laser Sub Machine gun, one barrel's over your hand and one under, they fire in succession with very little recoil, unlike the GSMGs, which fire two slugs at a time and have recoil. Your HUD…" Shepard drew an eyepiece from his armour's compartments and handed it to Wrex, who attached it over his left eye, two crosshairs popped up. "Your HUD will display the two targeting reticules, don't hit any friendly targets if you use dual fire mode, just by the way." By this time, they'd reached their destination and dismounted, advancing cautiously into the Clinic.

Wrex was either impressed with or ashamed of working with this human, apparently one of their N7 Marines by his armour insignia, he was either very good at judging character or very foolhardy in trusting a Krogan so quickly. The group opened the second door of the clinic quietly, noticing a Turian crouched behind a desk with a pistol, who gestured for them to be quiet, and a group of thugs threatening a doctor, Dr. Michel.

"Did you tell Vakarian about the Quarian?"

"No, no I haven't." Dr. Michel was being held at gunpoint by one of the Turian thugs, who noticed Wrex's new friends just before he was finished saying "Good." Instead, he finished "Men, intruders!" just as the Turian leapt up and shot him between the eyes.

Wrex opened fire on the nearest thug, a Salarian, with his new weapon, tearing fist-sized holes out of the thug's unarmoured flesh and jerking him around, snapping the slim build of the Salarian in half, before he changed targets. He was now considering joining up the Coalition Marines like a few other Krogan had, they just had such nice equipment!

* * *

"Dr. Michel, are you alright?" Garrus ran up to his friend after the brief firefight was over and the thugs were reduced to cooling hunks of meat.

"I'm fine, Garrus, thanks for the save." Dr. Michel sat down heavily on one of the examination beds; she wasn't used to this sort of thing…

"That was a risky shot, Garrus." John stated, looking at the same Garrus Vakarian he had met back in the Council Chambers.

"I know, but it was better than sitting there and letting that Turian shoot the Doctor." Garrus shrugged "By the way, doctor, what were those thugs talking about?"

"A few hours ago, a Quarian came in and asked how she could get in contact with the Shadow Broker, I treated her for a bullet wound before I let her go to Fist. Apparently Fist turned on the Broker though… considering how his thugs turned up to silence me… oh no, you have to go save the Quarian!"

"Well, it seems we'll have to deal with Fist… though I hear the Broker's hired a Krogan mercenary to take down Fist, so the guy might not be available for questioning for all that long…" Garrus said, checking his sniper rifle and pistol, locking both into place on his armour.

"Fist will live long enough for you guys to question him." Wrex stated, lumbering up to the Turian.

"How do you—oh." Garrus raised a brow "You're the Krogan, aren't you?"

"Yes. Do NOT try telling me you're gonna try to arrest me, you would fail." Wrex replied, stroking his new weapon affectionately.

"Relax, man, I am not gonna try arresting you, I was wondering if I could join you guys and try to help out…" Garrus turned toward John.

"Sure, Garrus, feel free to come along." John Shepard said before Wrex could comment.

"Meh, the more hands, the better." Wrex, amazingly, did not object then. However, he did object when they were trying to crowd into a cab. "I don't think we'll all fit, Shepard." Was his comment as he was getting squeezed against the window, despite his armour.

"I agree, Kaidan, catch another cab, Ashley, Babysit him." John's tone made it clear he wasn't serious. "Meet us outside Chora's Den once we finish with Fist."

"Sure, sir, will do."

* * *

Commander Shepard, Garrus Vakarian, and Urdnot Wrex exited the Citadel rapid Transit vehicle a good fifty meters from the door to Chora's Den. Then they marched closer, powering up their armour's shields, Shepard leading because he had the strongest shields. "Seems like it's been locked down… Garrus, plant the breaching charge" He handed Garrus a large packet with text on one side saying "This side to the door" "And get the hell out of there, I'll spearhead, you and Wrex come in after me and clear out the rest of the thugs."

"No problem" The Turian slapped the package onto the door, where it stuck, and then scooted back while Shepard depressed the remote detonator. The door flew apart as the Electron Grenade that was the package's main contents (other than the detonator and adhesives) ripped into it, while the area was still smoking, Shepard opened up with his LBR, the laser bolts easily penetrating the smoke, vaporizing particles in its way, and not being diffracted enough to go off course. He fired as he moved, his Cybran Heavy armour locking his right arm to fire on the targets with pinpoint accuracy and to reinforce his grip while his left arm drew his LSMG. It was more visible than a GSMG (Gauss Submachine Gun) and had a lower rate of fire, but hey he was already using his LBR in Assault Rifle Mode and spitting out bolts anyways, so who cared?

The thugs were firing blindly into the cloud of dust and smoke while he took them down one by one, their weak weapons, typical of those found in Council Space, did essentially nothing to his shields and couldn't do much unless by mass accurate fire, which was NOT happening.

By the time the dust cleared and he rolled behind a crate to hide from a thug wielding a grenade launcher, more than half the thugs were dead, his new partners had killed around half of them, they'd done pretty well.

"Wrex, do you have biotics?"

"One of the items involved in the definition of the term 'Krogan Battlemaster' is biotics, Shepard." The Krogan boomed over the radio.

"Wrex, Lift the Grenadier!"

"Will do" The grenadier suddenly found himself several meters out of his cover, and riddled by bullets from Garrus and Laser bolts from Wrex, while Shepard suppressed the thugs trying to suppress his teammates. The thugs didn't have much in the way of shields, so his laser bolts tore through them within two hits, if his LBR had been in Sniper Mode, he could have punched through eight or even ten thugs with one bolt, easily. After all, two overcharged hits could punch through an unupgraded Land Scout, unless it was a Selen Combat Scout (each sniper mode bolt with the overcharge ability does 20 damage, two hits are required to kill an armoured Coalition Marine).

One the initial group went down the trio circled around the circular bar stage and took out several more hostiles near the back entrance to the Den. Wrex kicked in the door because Shepard's shield was low from taking grenades and concentrated fire. They found two workers there, holding pistols in shaking hands.

"Is Fist really worth dying for? Don't you both have somewhere else to be at the moment?" John turned up the luminosity on his helmet's fake eye-slits to appear more intimidating.

"Uh… yeah, he doesn't pay us properly anyways." The workers dropped their guns and ran past the group, fleeing out the front door of Chora's Den. The trio blinked collectively (including Shepard's helmet lights) at the comical cloud of dust the workers' exit left, then turned to their mission objective, Fist's door.

Shepard was the first in, rolling behind a piece of cover on the right side of the room while his partners took to the left, as Fist's two defensive turrets powered up and opened fire, slowly chewing away at their cover. Shepard primed an Electron grenade "Garrus, Overload, right turret!"

"Will do" The overload pulse took out the right side turret's shields as Shepard threw the grenade. The small explosive device bounced off the left wall and came to rest next to the right side turret. Upon seeing it, fist dove back behind his desk, which was scorched by the explosion that occurred a mere moment later. The turret flew apart and the other one's shield was decimated. Wrex took it out with a long burst of LSMG bolts over his filing cabinets.

As soon as Fist popped back up, Shepard nailed him with a single bolt to the shoulder, rifle set on low output. The man fell sideways, into the open, and while Garrus and Wrex had their weapons trained on him Shepard advanced, his Laser Pistol also trained on the man. Then he picked the man up with one hand, while jamming the pistol under his chin.

"Don't kill me! Don't kill me!" Fist said frantically, wincing in pain as Shepard pushed a forearm into his badly scorched shoulder.

"Well, then I think you'd better get talking, shouldn't you?" Sheppard once again intensified the red glow of his helmet eye-slits, bathing the man's face in red light, then dimmed the lights slightly. "Tell us about the Quarian."

"She said she'd only speak to the Shadow Broker when she dropped by."

"No one talks to the Shadow Broker, only his agents." Wrex stated, narrowing his eyes at the man.

"She doesn't know that, I told her I could arrange a conference or at least a direct video link to the Shadow Broker, she's waiting in the alley behind the Zakera Ward Markets, but she'll be met by assassins, not the Broker's agents… now can you please let me go?"

"I'm done with you, gotta go save the Quarian." Shepard had begun moving toward the door, still holding the man by the front of his shirt. "as I said, I'm done with you, but someone else isn't…" as he passed Wrex with Garrus, he dropped the man in front of Wrex, who grinned and pointed his shotgun at the man.

"The Shadow Broker sends his regards" Fist's head was plastered across the floor before he could say a thing, Wrex casually blew on the barrel of his Shotgun to clear the smoke before holstering it and drawing his LSMG again, he really liked that weapon…

Shepard had thoroughly raided the office for credits and supplies by the time Wrex was finished his business. The trio trooped out of the office to be met by more thugs and assassins, which were cut down mercilessly before they rushed out toward the alley.

* * *

"Where is the Broker, or the video uplink?" Tali'Zorah nar Rayya was beginning to think something's wrong, so she was tweaking the settings on her tech mine behind her back.

"Don't worry, dear, he's on his way." The Turian said.

"Forget it, the deal's off." The moment the two Salarians went for their pistols she dove toward a nearby crate and dumped the tech mine behind her. She drew her shotgun as she heard the mine go off and overload the shields of the three, then she fired a blast around her piece of cover, rewarded by a scream of pain, then the sounds of the others going for cover and their shields recharging. The odds weren't good, her enviro-suit had minimal shields and armour, and her shotgun was fairly old and probably wouldn't do all that much.

Two short buzzing sounds produced a scream, then another cut it off. Then something metallic bounced along the deck until there was a large explosion that lit up the alley. She looked around her crate to see a Turian with a pistol and sniper rifle, a Krogan with a shotgun and some unknown weapon with two barrels, and an unknown being in black armour with red eye-slits. The wing-like spikes on the back of the helmet and armour were painted red and black, and the being was clutching a large weapon that looked like a scaled-up assault rifle, all in all, the being resembled something out of a legend to scare children with.

Then the being took off its helmet, and for a moment she thought she was looking at a Quarian, then she remembered one of the newest discovered species, humans, that looked almost exactly like Quarians other than five-digit hands and toes. Incidentally, their females bore an extreme resemblance to Asari, other than hair and skin tone."Hello, I'm Commander Shepard, N7 Marine of the Coalition of Species, are you alright, Miss?" He extended a hand to help her up, she took it gratefully.

"Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, thank you, Commander Shepard. That Fist! He set me up!" She was past the battle-calm stage now, and anger was kicking in.

"We've gotten rid of him, why were they after you?"

"I don't know, Dr. Michel said he worked for the Shadow Broker, but she also said Saren had a feud with the Broker… oh, Fist must have turned his allegiance… I was trying to get some credits to help continue my Pilgrimage, so I thought I could sell some information I came across."

"On your Pilgrimage? Is there a religious connotation?" John was genuinely puzzled, it wouldn't be a good sign if she was some sort of zealot… like what the Order of the Illuminate had been made of.

"No, we leave the Migrant Fleet to find something worthwhile to bring back to the Fleet." Tali said, shifting from foot to foot nervously.

"By the way, we're trying to take down Saren, Dr. Michel said you might have some information on his activities…"

"Yes, I should repay you for saving me, shouldn't I…" Tali brought up her Omni-tool before Garrus interjected.

"We should continue this conversation in the Ambassador's Office, it's not safe here." Shepard mentally gave Garrus another checkmark; he recognized that, a good sign of his tactical abilities, Wrex was doing the same.

* * *

"You aren't making my life easy Shepard. Firefights in the wards, an all out assault on Chora's Den. Do you know how many people…" Udina stopped short, staring at the last of Shepard's crew to come in. "Who is she?"

"Someone who has the evidence we need." Shepard said simply. "If you want to know more, ask her yourself."

"Please start at the beginning, miss?" Udina turned the sentence into a question.

"My name's Tali'Zorah nar Rayya. I was investigating Geth activity…" The rude ambassador interrupted her before she could finish, causing Tali to wonder how the hell the bosh'tet got his job.

"Don't Quarians usually stay in the Migrant Fleet?" Udina cut in, Shepard blinked at the man's rudeness. "Why did you leave?"

"I was on my pilgrimage when I heard reports of Geth activity outside the Perseus Veil. Since they were the ones who drove my people into exile and have not been seen in 600 years, I was naturally curious as to what they were doing. I was able to catch one alone, destroy it, and salvage some of its memory core."

"Excuse me, miss, but don't Geth usually destroy their memory cores when they die?" Anderson was genuinely puzzled, or at least he sounded that way, so Tali didn't mind, unlike the obnoxious Ambassador…

"Well, my people created the Geth, I knew what to look for and was just lucky, I guess. So anyways, here's the audio file…"

Saren's voice played in the office "Eden Prime was a major victory; it brought us one step closer to the Conduit."

A second voice joined in "And one step closer to the return of the Reapers."

"Does anyone know what that second voice belongs to?" Shepard looked around. "Damn."

"I've heard that the Geth revere the Reapers as gods, and there's tales of a race wiping out the Protheans 50,000 years ago…" Tali said, sceptical of that bit of info herself.

"Well, now I know what the beacon vision was about, it was about the Reapers wiping out the Protheans." John suddenly said.

"Hmm, that sounds interesting, Shepard, and Plausible." Wrex said.

"The Geth think Saren is a prophet for the return of the Reapers, thus they follow him."

"Thanks for that tidbit, Miss Tali, but that isn't relevant right now, what is relevant is how the files prove Saren is a traitor."

"We should throw this in the face of the Council at the earliest possible time, come on!" Udina ran for the elevator so fast Tali's hood cloth was ruffled by the wind.

"I believe the phrase you humans use is 'Like a kid in a candy store'…" Wrex said, blinking extremely slowly and dramatically.

"I agree, gotta wonder how he got the job…" John blinked his helmet lights.

"Anyways, what are we going to do about Tali?" Garrus asked.

"Miss Tali'Zorah, would you be willing to join me on my mission against Saren?" John turned to the suited woman.

"Our Pilgrimage proves we are willing to give of ourselves for the greater good. What does it say about me if I turn my back on this?" Tali said through her mouthpiece, secretly ecstatic that she had found something to be a part of again, as she'd yearned for ever since she left the fleet.

* * *

"The evidence is irrefutable, the Council agrees to strip Saren Arterius of his Spectre status." Councillor Velarn agreed. The evidence brought forth, though by a Quarian, was too solid for any debate on the Council's part.

"It's not enough to say he's guilty, the Council should send a fleet as a show of support for the Coalition's lockdown of the area!" Indeed, the Coalition of Species had flooded the area with Hunter Squadrons, stationing one in nearly every major system and detaching their Hunter Clutches to stand guard over minor systems in the area. All in all, there were over twenty Hunter Squadrons in that area of space, Councillor Velarn's opinion was that any Council fleet sent would be like a drop in an ocean, pointless.

"That carries too much risk of war with the Terminus Systems, a war which would be quite costly…" Velarn supplied, if the Coalition wanted to kick the asses of the Terminus Powers or the Geth, they should feel free, and NOT drag the Council into this whole mess.

"That's bullshit and they know it." John whispered to Anderson, Udina, on the other side, heard the comment rather clearly.

"I agree, now…" he was cut off

"Perhaps there is another way…" Tevos steepled her fingers thoughtfully, looking at the other two Councillors.

Velarn shook his head "I disagree, it is too soon."

"No, it is perfect. Ambassador Udina gets what he's wanted for a long time, and we don't have to send in a fleet to show our support." Armin said. "I agree, Councillor Tevos, let it be so."

"Commander Shepard, step forward please."

* * *

"That was a lot of words." Garrus said, while following Shepard around the Citadel towards Dock 422, to Wrex, who was walking beside him.

"Yes, that was indeed an epic crapload of words." The Krogan almost surprised himself by agreeing with the Turian.

"You know, I never really liked bureaucratic red tape, really smothers you." Garrus mimed taping his mouth shut to Wrex, who grunted in agreement.

"Well then you should try the red sand on Tuchanka, it smothers you worse when a dust storm's up…"

"They make red sand on Tuchanka? I thought er… you guys um… almost, to use the human phrase, 'bombed yourselves back to the Stone Age'? How do they make Red Sand on Tuchanka?"

Wrex grabbed a nearby innocent pillar and started banging his head plate against it with a groan "Garrus, learn to get a joke… The sand on Tuchanka's red, and when there's a sandstorm, ti chokes you up, so it's Red Sand, duh…"

"You know, on the Normandy, you could do that with the tables, decks or counters, but don't try it on chairs, they might break from you guys joking around." John Shepard said in a completely serious voice, while recording the spectacle of a Krogan banging his head into a random innocent pillar with some amusement behind his now-polarized visor (he'd traded the Heavy helmet for the Light for now, yes, the armours can be mixed and matched.)

After some Citadel Rapid Transit, Shepard announced "Well, here we are, feel free to look around while I talk to Captain Anderson and Idiot Udina." Wrex chuckled as Shepard left the three to look up at the ship.

"That's a pretty nice ship." Garrus said, causing Tali to visor-palm (hereby termed facepalm) at the sheer obviousness.

"Garrus, can you stop stating the hideously obvious? I wonder what weapons it's got… those gun barrels look large enough for Tali to fit inside." Indeed, the Proton Cannons were rather large-calibre, so much so that Wrex suspected he would be able to shove a Krogan's leg or arm up it without trouble, armour and all.

"There are two distinctly visible secondary guns at the tips of the wings, and three missile batteries I can see, along with those bulb-things, probably Tactical Missile Defences…"

"Forget that, what sort of engine powers this thing? I wonder…" the Quarian was also excited, but she was the one that really showed it.

* * *

A/N: A corvette looks a bit like a Starcraft Battlecruiser minus the hammerhead and wingtip prong-things, but measuring only 150 x 100 m I believe I said in Ch. 1. Two Zealot SIM Launchers are built into the wings, one on either side, able to swing up/down up to 150 degrees (pointing backward by 60 degrees from vertical) or to lock forward (for aerodynamics when in-atmosphere), wings are for manoeuvring in dogfights, not for lift, that's provided by anti-gravity systems. The forward part of the wingtips carry fully traversable (360 degrees spin, plus/minus 90 tilt) Dual Quantum Cannons, 1 per tip. The rear ends of the wing tip areas carry 1 Zapper TMD each.

Near the front, the Corvette has a smaller, boxy section attached to the bigger boxy section (like the neck on the SC Battlecruisers). On the underside of the hull of the smaller section is the Dual Proton Cannon. On the upper side of the bigger boxy section is the fold-out Zealot SIM (only one onboard able to rotate left/right, fold-out is like the Transcender SAM from SupCom 1/FA, which the Zealot SIM was based on). The nose of the corvette is a pyramid capped off by a Zapper TMD.

Propulsion-wise, in addition to the main quantum impulse drives (Seraphim contribution), there are emergency drives along the roots of the wings (1 per side, THESE look like the SC Battlecruiser prongs) as well as at the back of the ship, they are also used as secondary thrusters in combat.

For those who think that's too little in weapons, a Salem-class Destroyer is about that size and has a crapload less guns. Also, the reason the Stealth Frigates are not called Prowlers is because 1. That's the Cybran T1 Interceptor, and 2. Prowlers have reduced weapons, Stealth Corvettes simply cannot over-load their docking clamps, that's all, standard corvette weapons are still all fully functional and present.

* * *

"Shepard, Matriarch Benezia's daughter, Liara T'Soni, is an archaeologist; she was last reported in the Artemis Tau Cluster. Therum is the only planet there that has any significant numbers of Prothean ruins, go find her there and see if she's willing to cooperate, if she isn't, you know what to do. We're assigning you an SCU for this Saren hunt; it's the Seraphim Model, which most commanders seem to like the most. Don't over-spend, it's not as much storage as an ACU these days, and the same health. (They upgraded ACUs after the Seraphim War to match the SCUs). Be careful out there, Shepard. By the way, that means only one Restorer Gunship for you on this hut, a Corvette can't carry that many unless by taxing the clamps, and the Normandy can't do that without losing stealth." Anderson quickly said to Shepard.

"Wait, aren't you coming with me?"

"No, Spectre, a Spectre needs a ship and crew, we've decided that we'd give you the Normandy, Captain Anderson will remain here at the Citadel until further notice." Udina said, making Shepard strongly inclined to slug the man's teeth out for his political treachery, then the scumbag left.

"Sorry, Captain… I never knew the bastard would try this sort of shit…" John shook his head sadly.

"It's alright, John, I have faith in you, besides, seems to me like you're already gathering your crew for this Saren-hunt… now get your ass over to Therum, you've got a young Asari to meet."

"Thanks, Captain…" John saluted respectfully before turning to the three he'd picked up, Ashley and Kaidan had been sent back to the Normandy once he'd found out they wouldn't be needed. "Hey guys, come on over, welcome aboard the CSC Normandy, one of the Coalition's newest Stealth Corvettes."

* * *

A/N: Review, Comment. Any Recommendations are welcome.

For Technical Details (e.g. ship sizes) please see Chapter 1, thank you for reading.


	12. Behold, the CSC Normandy

A/N: If you don't like how I made the Normandy look, please note that I do not play EVE Online or any other MMORPGs, so don't cite ships from there. Also, the Coalition ships are a mix of all four styles (but generally without the Seraphim asymmetry thing), so there is no way any non-originally-deisgned ship is going to fit the description all that well.

* * *

Chapter 12: Behold, the CSC Normandy

_En Route to Therum, CSC Normandy, 31 May, 3868_

"So, Garrus, what do you think of the ship so far?" John Shepard was talking to a pair of legs sticking out from inside the Rhino Medium Tank parked in the cargo bay.

"Fascinating, though I think by far the most fascinating is how you humans manage to make all your vehicles so freaking huge… and so powerful, and spam them, all at the same time."

"Ah, the wonders of nanolathing…" John sighed happily. "Have you tested the on-board nanolathe yet?"

"Yep, and to be honest, I love it, and I absolutely loved the ACU simulators, it felt like it was real…" the bank of simulators contained twelve simulators in a row, able to fully network with one another, it allowed Commanders to hone their skills easily and as one body, maintaining fleet radio silence in the act. "I should probably get down to the weapons bay when I'm done tinkering with this…"

"You know if you break it and need it fixed up again, that's what the construction arms are for, right?" John asked the pair of armoured legs.

"Yes, Thanks Shepard."

* * *

"Your Coalition sure knows how to make weapons and armour, Shepard." Wrex said, flexing his right hand, which held an LBR-2 (henceforth simply LBR), hefting its weight and assessing its balance.

"All the Krogan that have joined up with the Coalition so far have said that, or something like that, and none, count them, zero, have left the Coalition or died there so far. By the way, Wrex, I've heard that Krogan simply cannot die of old age, is that true?"

"Well, yes, no Krogan has ever died of old age thus far in our history, we always eventually die in combat or in accidents"

"So, uh, how old are you?"

"Around 1300 Galactic Standard Years" oddly, the Galactic Standard Year was very, very close to the Earth, Thessia, and Palaven Year. "How old are you?" Wrex was indeed curious to find out how old such an excellent combatant was.

"I'm only physically around 25 Galactic Standard Years old, even with the accelerated maturation of Cybrans caused by the implants… otherwise, I'm only 19. But don't worry my combat and training records support my rank."

"By the standards of your race, that is very young indeed for a soldier." Wrex nodded to Shepard.

"That is true… However, let's talk about your armour… I recommend Seraphim armour to accommodate your hump, would that be alright with you? How does Seraphim Heavy sound?"

"Give me a run-through of the Seraphim armours, if you don't mind…" Wrex was interested, one of his old friends, after joining the coalition Marines, had bragged to him over a drink about the wonders of Coalition armours, so his interest had been piqued.

Shepard drew up a hologram of the Light Seraphim Armour "Well, the Seraphim Light has a rhombus-shaped body, with a large polarized visor for the head area, light gauntlets and leg armour; it contains extra pneumatics for greater speed for rushing and charges. The Light has no over-shield, but it has a faster weapon recharge time, especially for special abilities like overcharged shots, and its structural field is reasonably strong, good enough to stand up to anything short of heavy weapons in the Council Races with ease. The shield's okay, but not all that special…" Shepard paused, drawing up another hologram of a heavier suit. "The Medium has an over-shield on top of shields and structural fields; it has the beginnings of the arm-shoulder towers, allowing additional weapons to be carried as well as thicker limb armour. However some mobility is lost and it does not have accelerated ability recharge." Shepard drew up the hologram of the last, heaviest armour of the line. "This is the Seraphim Heavy Armour; it has full arm-towers that you can store weapons in, one heavy weapon to each tower and some light weapons, and it has a fully-sealed helmet area, the 'face' is for intimidation with its yellow lights. The back of this armour contains a Restoration Field Emitter that slowly repairs/heals friendly units in the area. I don't think any of the Coalition's other armours are suitable for use by Krogan, though the core Coalition species can use any one of the four."

"Shepard, considering the combat style of most Krogan, what did you think I would choose?"

"Either the medium so you can stare through the visor at the enemy, and for some speed in addition to the presence of the over-shield, or the Heavy for slightly more durability, heavy weapons, and the Restoration Field, be warned, Wrex, that Seraphim Heavy unless extensively customized is not very biotic-friendly, you're a biotic, choose wisely."

"You know as well as I do that I don't use biotics all that much unless I have to, I prefer raw firepower. I think the Seraphim Heavy armour would suit me the best."

Shepard shrugged and pressed the correct buttons to start the nanolathing of said armour "If that was a pun, Wrex, it wasn't funny."

"As I have heard humans say on occasion, 'Hallelujah, tell me something I don't know'. I forget where I picked that line up, but hey…" John blinked once at Wrex, and then went back to the large nanolathe, which had rolled forward with the armour on a pedestal.

"Well, Wrex, it's ready, you should probably get used to it before our next mission."

* * *

Tali'Zorah nar Rayya's professional assessment of the human corvette, as they'd called it, was that it would probably able to outgun a pair of Council frigates with ease, its huge missile launchers and menacing guns supporting her analysis. The aesthetics… could have been better, being sharp and angular, but still a good mix of predatory angles and defensive squares in its lines. The forward-sweeping angles of sharp trigonometrically appealing lines in a matte black finish, lined with the occasional ominous piece of red circuitry joined seamlessly with dull grey metal, in defensive squared-off angles and shapes. The occasional curve in the lines was in a nearly white metal finish, beautifying some of the ship's joints from the blocky and/or predatory lines that dominated the design.

The armour seemed to not be made of plates at all, but instead seemingly created from one piece of material, flawless and smooth, she wondered how it was made… The dual-barrelled guns at the wing tips had smooth, curvy lines, unlike the rest of the craft; she wondered why they were so different in appearance from the hull. The same was true of the three missile launchers. Unlike those weapons, the three Tactical Missile Defences seemed to fit in perfectly, with their angular actuator lines and armoured housings. The enormous chin guns were in a turret fifteen meters wide and, including the barrels, twenty meters long, ending in two large muzzles, each six-sided, with every other side much longer than the others, resulting in two sort-of triangular barrels (A/N: barrel shape is similar to the barrels shown on the Cybranasaurus Rex in the SupCom 2 Official Cybran wallpaper, which are not in fact present in-game, but this turret is the same as the one on the Siren-class Destroyer from SupCom 1, Cybran Navy).

For its size, the thrusters did not look all that huge, so the ship likely wasn't built for manoeuvrability, but the massive rear of the ship and the visible, very large, rear thruster ports meant the ship could most likely pull off very good acceleration and speed. Her opinion was that unless there was something else to help those side thrusters, deceleration for the ship would not be much better than for Council frigates, which were like it in size.

However, Tali had a slight feeling that for taking on anything short of a Turian Cruiser, the ship would be more than adequate in firepower, armour and shields, though she couldn't gauge the shields yet. Thus, the manoeuvrability would not be so much of an issue. The smaller craft docked to the bottom of the corvette looked interesting, about half the size of a Light Frigate by Citadel standards. It seemed well-armed, two large missile launchers under the wings and a four-barrelled chin gun making up its weapons. Looking at it, she got the distinct impression that it could probably take on a Council Frigate one-on-one if it came down to it. If that was a shuttle, it sure looked pretty different from the rest of the ship, with its smooth curves and graceful lines, except for the anchorage points where it attached to the corvette. A towering humanoid robot was being attached to the anchorage points closer to the back of the corvette as they approached the ship, also comprised of curvy lines, but with sharp points and asymmetry evident in its design.

She couldn't wait to see the inside the corvette and the support craft, find out how they worked, and see if there was anything she could tweak…

* * *

"Hello Tali, how have you been fitting in?" Shepard asked, he had talked to Adams earlier, and apparently Tali was a tech prodigy, more or less, she could take any mass effect tech and improve its efficacy.

"I've been fitting in just fine, Commander Shepard, it's amazing how your Coalition managed to fit such a large mass effect core inside such a small ship…" She said, gazing over her shoulder at the Tantalus Core, which was the secondary core after the primary quantum core. "In addition to that other core, that operates on principles the rest of the galaxy hasn't even really understood…"

"Well, we managed to somehow stuff the thing in here… Just to inform you, Adams came into my suite after his shift practically with his jaw scraping along the floor at your abilities. He said that in all his hundred years of engineer experience, he'd never met anyone who was as much of a natural. This is coming from someone who's helped design a lot of the ships the Coalition fields and has served on all of them."

Tali blushed under her visor, Shepard could see it, before she said "I'll thank him for that, then. We Quarians do tend to be good with ships, they are our homes, after all… Wait, hundred years? How long do you humans live?"

"The average UEF or Aeon can expect up to three hundred fifty years at least, and the average Cybran can expect upward of four hundred years. Adams was hand-picked for this posting, that says something if he's impressed with you. It means I should be bowing down in the light of your glory."

"There's no… oh, you're joking around, aren't you?" Tali had blushed before she realized he was joking. "The average Quarian lives around a hundred and fifty years, it is rare to see a Quarian over a hundred and seventy these days due to our immune deficiency, caused by too many generations in the relatively sterile environment of starships. Is there anything else you'd like to talk about, Commander Shepard?"

"Well, I've always wanted to meet and talk to a Quarian. Your people's history is fascinating, according to what the Council Races have been willing to tell us. Also, it's just Shepard; the Commander part is reserved for stupid politicians to use, most of the time." Shepard was contemplating what type of armour would suit the lithe woman the best, so far he had narrowed it down to one of the Aeon models, but he wasn't sure which.

"Yes, I agree, it would be fascinating… it's also quite sad… we, all seventeen million survivors, live on the Migrant Fleet, it is the largest fleet in known space, made up of tens of thousands of ships, constantly in need of repair, some of them were never intended for interstellar travel… but we make do with what we have, and we have survived to this day. It is the hope of all Quarians that one day; we will be able to take back our Homeworld from the Geth."

"Why did the Geth go to war with you?" Shepard was reminded of the escape of the symbionts and founding of the Cybran Nation by Tali's tale, he wanted to know more, so that he could make a recommendation to Dr. Brackman to render immediate assistance to the Quarians. As to how he could reach Dr. Brackman, let it suffice to say that Hannah Shepard is one of the top commanders in Coalition Space, and being such has nearly direct access to Dr. Brackman and the other leaders… the wonders of politics…

"They were originally designed as VI, Virtual Intelligences, to help us with our daily lives, until we began to network them to serve us better." Shepard's eye began to twitch slightly, the story was sounding more like the Earth Empire's oppression of the symbionts than the tale of the Founding of the Cybran Nation. Tali continued, not noticing "they developed sentience somehow by way of the network, forming a hive-mind type entity. We tried to strike pre-emptively, but they had evolved far further than we had expected, the attempt to de-network or failing that destroy the Geth failed, and the Geth Uprising began. Over a period of several Standard Galactic Years, roughly equivalent to Quarian years, they systematically eradicated our colonies until our Home Fleet broke through their battle line at the last stand over our Homeworld. The evacuation fleet fled the planet through the breach while most of what was left of the military expended themselves holding the gap open. According to our archives, the ancestors of today's Quarians watched their Homeworld burn behind them as they fled. We were down to one city, the capital city, by that point, and the defenders gave all their lives so that we could escape." Tali paused for breath. "The Geth oddly did not pursue the Migrant Fleet, and they have remained behind the Perseus Veil ever since they evicted us."

Shepard was caught up in a vision of the Quarians burning Geth worlds, except this time it was historical footage of an Earth Empire fleet raining dirty bombs onto the surface of Procyon, the first Core World of the Cybran Nation. Though the planet had been re-terraformed, it was still a fairly desolate place and only a few hardy plants could survive there. Then he was treated with a vision of Earth Empire ships fleeing Earth while a Cybran Fleet chased them from Earth and took it over. He thought out loud "You know, from the story you've told me, I find it kind of hard to have that much sympathy for your people. You tried to exterminate the Geth; did you expect them to just die like that?"

Tali couldn't believe her ears "Geth do not die! They aren't even alive in the first place!" she whispered extremely loudly after a brief pause. Here was the first sentient that was fully accepting of her being a Quarian, and the first thing he says after hearing of the Quarians' plight was that he had no sympathy? She felt tears of frustration welling up in her eyes and cursed her visor; she couldn't even wipe them away effectively due to the Quarian immune system's inadequacy.

"I'm sorry if I upset you, but please, read this history document and watch the documentary before you judge me for it." Shepard transferred two files to her Omni-tool, nodded to the silent Quarian, and left "I hope the next time we talk; we can choose armour for you… and that we can come to understand each other better."

"Goodbye, Shepard, I hope to talk again." Tali turned and walked over to Engineer Adams, blinking down tears "Sir, Commander Shepard has given me a couple of files to consult; I would like to spend some time examining them, would that be alright?"

"Tali, you've made more improvements in the last two hours than have probably been made since this ship was built, of course you deserve to take a break, by the way, your quarters are labelled Number 11, Shepard's quarters are Number 00, the rest of the original crew is through to Number 08, now that Number 09, Jenkins, has been transferred, Ashley took his quarters, and the original 00, Anderson, has transferred his quarters to Shepard."

"So how many people share a numbered room?"

"What do you mean? Except for married couples, every crewmember gets his or her own numbered suite, though it is just a bedroom and ensuite. The mess hall is where everyone goes for food." Adams seemed genuinely surprised by the question "That's how it is on all Coalition starships."

"Sounds like an awful waste of space… Wait; there are only nine original crewmen here? So besides Joker, Shepard, Pressly, yourself, Ashley and Kaidan, there are only four other crewmen on the ship… That's Gardner, Chakwas, Ken and Gabby. How do you run a ship with such a puny crew? Let alone a ship with two reactor cores?" (A/N: The Old Crew is literally gonna get back together in ME 2, more or less.)

"A lot of the systems are automated, VI-controlled, don't worry, we don't network them to any significant degree, so there's no risk of a Geth-style Uprising here, and anyways, no AI would ever revolt in the Coalition. Adams left unsaid the fact that the AIs were mostly either integrated into a Cybran's mental processes, helping them do things, or they were from dead people who had chosen to enter the cybernetic realm. "Now, I think you should go check out your quarters."

"Alright, thank you, Mr. Adams, I'll be on my way now."

"Didn't I ask you to just call me just Adams?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Right, sorry, I forgot…"

"Meh, it's nothing, now I think you really should go check out your quarters, you'll be pleasantly surprised."

* * *

"Keelah…" Pleasantly surprised was an understatement, Tali was floored, this place was so… decadent… compared to what she was used to on the Migrant Fleet, and it was only crewmen's quarters! What would Captain's Quarters look like?

The first thing she spotted, on the right side from the door, was a panel of switches, she noted with some surprise that one of them said "Sterilization fields, full apartment" That was good, it meant she could move around outside her suit, even if she would only do so to bathe and go to the washroom. Her suit usually took care of both those needs, but it wasn't all that comfortable with its automated vacuum, an actual toilet was much nicer, though the Migrant Fleet could not afford it, due to the excessive numbers of sterilization field emitters needed and the fact that they were more needed for the clean rooms so critical to the Quarians' survival as a species. Just beyond the panel was a door, plainly painted a light cream colour, she opened it to reveal an ensuite washroom with a sink, a toilet, and a shower stall. The space was large enough to have been used as a Quarian's habitation cubicle on the Migrant Fleet, here on a Coalition of Species ship; it was just a washroom…

She was taking note of the water purifier sitting in an alcove in the wall, which sterilized the water enough for her suit's scanners to declare it safe to drink for Quarians when she saw another sterilization field, on the inside of the toilet, seemingly newly installed. Apparently the Coalition of Species had the hardware onboard its ships, ready to install whenever they hosted a Quarian or immune-deficient individual, such luxuries were unheard of on the Fleet…

She left the washroom and looked around the main room, which contained a large bed (A/N: what we'd call queen size) with a mattress at least four times thicker than those issued on the Migrant Fleet, which were essentially four-centimetre sleeping mats. A computer console sat in the far corner opposite the bed, dark, silent and shut down. A desk was on the closer side, next to the bed, against the wall, along with a comfortable-looking chair with wheels. On the Fleet, this room could have housed four Quarians with bunk beds…

Tali prodded the soft mattress before testing the chair, firing up the computer console and transferring Shepard's two files over to it. Sitting down, she began to read, and the tale of Humanity's leap to the stars, the dawn of the Quantum Age, the birth of the Symbionts, the founding of the Cybran Nation began to unravel. The historical discovery of the Seraphim, the rise of the Aeon Illuminate, and the Infinite War began to unfold before the Quarian's eyes…

* * *

"You humans did your work well, managing to fight each other for a thousand years without reducing yourselves to semi-savages like we Krogan did." Wrex commented to himself as he watched the documentary on human history in his quarters. The furniture was strong, he had in fact sat on the toilet without any creaking or weird noises, and the chair had held his weight without any sign of trouble, and the bed was reasonably soft and comfortable without too much give in its springs, perfect for a Krogan.

The inside of his Seraphim Heavy Armour had… flowed around his frame to suit him better. It was a nice feature in Coalition armours, Shepard had told him, the armours can somewhat change their internal shape to suit the user. He'd stashed his old weapons in the back of his weapons locker, common to all Coalition crew quarters and situated under the bed, and stocked up on new weapons, which Shepard was now authorized to release to him on a permanent basis.

Wrex had been ecstatic to receive the new and highly destructive weapons, and he had spent several hours in the firing range testing out his new armour and weapons before coming to his assigned quarters, which were quite nice, but far less so than his new gear. Being a Krogan Battlemaster, one of the few still alive, had given him plenty of experience at destructive machinery, but this Coalition stuff took it to a whole new level. He now had with him a Sonic Pulse Shotgun, a GSMG (he had decided to trade in the LSMG for the higher firing rate of the Gauss weapon), a ULPA as one of his heavy weapons, and an Infantry Nanodart Launcher for his second heavy weapon. For his sidearm, he had chosen to use one of the Phasic Pistols, it wasn't as fast at shooting as the Gauss Pistols, or as precise as the Laser Pistols, but it had the best anti-armour capability, something he liked in a pistol, very much.

He crunched up some more popcorn, as the Mess Sergeant, Gardner, had called it, as he watched the documentary roll onward. It was nice to feel at home among all these new implements of destruction… Wrex smiled to himself as he settled into his new quarters, it was good to feel at home, period.

It was also good to have a small fridge, cupboard, and microwave in one's quarters, but that was another story altogether.

* * *

Garrus Vakarian was trying to outdo the nanolathed Shepard had shown him. Considering how he had spent two hours trying to make the thing fail at creating something, other than proper food, which Shepard had warned him against trying, and consistently failed, he was clawing at his fringe in frustration. Shepard walked in just then, and so Garrus accosted him "Is there _anything_, other than food and organic matter, that a nanolathe cannot make effectively?"

"Not much that I can think of, Garrus, anyways, I think it's time for you to pick armour for yourself." John said "This is a Coalition ship, and I don't want to pressure you, it's just that some of the Coalition armours would greatly increase your survivability in the field. We should go through them and find one that suits you."

"As I think Wrex would say, better armour and guns are always good. Lead the way!" Garrus followed Shepard over to the larger nanolathe machine, and Shepard drew up several schematics.

"Alright, let's start with the UEF models and Cybran armours, I think they'll suit you the best, as you don't seem to be extremely specialized as is typical of Aeon armours." John drew up two sets of schematics, each set of three rotating faintly in the air, appeared, projected by his own armour's chest piece. "The UEF Light," One of the armours grew to a full size projection and the others dimmed. "This is the only Light armour with an over-shield, which makes sense as the UEF armours are protection-oriented, mostly. It has a polarized visor, incorporating a high-powered HUD, Targeting computers, sensors, etc. like all the Light armours, with a full armoured and fielded helmet. The plating is designed to allow for decent flexibility while retaining superior protection in comparison to the other Light Armours, on par with that of the typical Medium Armour. It has no other special traits. The Medium is heavier in armour and more durable, on par with the Heavy armours of the other factions, but nothing else is particularly special, besides the hardened over-shield able to supercharge to cut down on damage from heavy weapons. The Heavy is the only armour able to Hunker/Entrench and can therefore survive overwhelming strikes even with shields down, in addition to its hardened shields and the shield field projection capability. Despite its actual shield and over-shield power being not much more than the Medium's, the Heavy has quite a bit more in armour and fields, as well as better shield regen. And that's that for the UEF armours, you may have noticed that the Medium looks like the UEF ACU while the Heavy has enormous shoulder pauldrons to allow for the hardened shields, a recessed head, and space for weapons storage. Any questions before we go to the Cybran armours?"

"Just one, what's the difference between Entrench and Hunker?"

"In Entrench, mobility is greatly reduced, you can still turn and stuff, but you can't move your legs effectively, extra armour plates lock into place, and your armour dumps extra power into shields and fields. In Hunker mode, your shoulder Pauldrons move down and in, encasing the top half of your body, and your leg armour curls up so that your knees are to your chest, then the armour's self-repair system assimilates mass from below your location and turns it into additional armour, then the suit pumps all its power to fields and shields. Testing has proved that in Entrench mode, a Marine can take a hit from an Aurora T1 tank without quite losing shields, three shots were enough to kill a Turian Landcruiser in the Turian War."

"That is pretty damned tough, so what can Hunker withstand?"

"Being embedded into the terrain, a Marine using Hunker can survive a shot from an ACU's cannon, assuming the ACU's not upgraded. He will only lose all his shields and external armour shell if he gets hit by one of the bomblets from a Lobo T1 Light Mobile Artillery, enough force to kill a Landcruiser in one shot. Other than the Zthuee and Lobo, all other T1 Light Mobile Artilleries, due to their lower splash, have enough concentrated power to kill a Marine even in Hunker in one hit." (A/N: this is 200 HP worth of damage; by the way, the Lobo bomblet is 120)

"…Wow… I'm probably going to choose UEF Heavy Armour unless something in the Cybran arsenal suits me more…"

"Alright, so a Cybran Light has the least protection of all Coalition armours, but it has the best cloaking system and permanent stealth, these traits make it favoured among snipers" Garrus nodded when John looked pointedly at his sniper rifle "Cybran Medium has better protection, but a weaker (shorter duration) cloak, though the cloak can still work for a long time, and it has the largest number of weapon attachment points among the medium armours. Cybran Heavy is what I have on now, three heavy weapons, unlike the two of each of the other Heavy armours, but it has a very short cloak duration, though retaining the stealth, and less durability. The upgrades are very diverse, allotting it to cater easily to the jack-of-all-trades. UEF Armours, by contrast, tend to lean towards durability upgrades and mobility improvements, which also cater to the jack-of-all-trades, in its own way. So, Garrus, what do you think would suit YOU the best?"

"I still think the UEF Heavy would be best for me… just a nagging feeling in the back of my head that the Hunker ability will come in useful someday…" Garrus said, scratching his fringe.

"Well, Garrus, I'm just gonna scan you, the computer didn't do that when you came onboard, odd… it did it for Wrex and Tali…" John faced Garrus for a moment "There, done, now we'll just wait for the nanolathe to fabricate it…" John tapped a button on the holographic interface in front of him, and then tapped his foot, looking over Garrus' shoulder at the nanolathe.

"What do you want to talk about in the mean—" Garrus was cut off by a "DING!" of the nanolathe finishing the job. "Already done? I underestimated the speed…"

"Well, Garrus, I think it would be a good idea for you to head for the Range to test out your armour." The Weapons Range took up a whole deck of the ship, which wasn't saying much as a Coalition Corvette had seven decks in its 30 meter tall body, but at least the Range allowed for over a hundred meters in which to shoot, not great for sniping, but adequate for most weapons, if you wanted better stuff, you could use the simulators. The Range also doubled as a gym on occasion.

"I agree, Shepard, I'll get to it right away, after I make sure the Rhino's anchored down…" Garrus made to move away from Shepard with his new armour in a cart, but was stopped by an armoured finger tapping his shoulder gently.

"There's no need, the ship automatically anchors vehicles down, and my HUD's telling me there's no problem with the procedure, so no need to go lock it down, Garrus, unless you left something over there…"

"Well, then I'll just pick up my toolkit before I head up to the Range, see you later, Shepard." Garrus left the cart where it was and walked over to the enormous tank, ducking inside one of the armoured hatches on top to retrieve his stuff as Shepard shrugged and left.

"Bye Garrus!" got a muffled response of "Bye Shepard… now where the hell is that toolkit?"

"Uh, Garrus, you do realize that a Rhino has two decks? Did you check to see if it fell down an emergency ladder to the bottom deck? By the way, on exit, use the back airlocks!"

"Alright!" Garrus's voice was even more muffled now, and so Shepard left, chuckling.

* * *

"Shepard, I'm sorry about my outburst earlier, I should not have grown irritated by what you said…" Tali hung her head in shame. Shepard had found her in the engineering bay, looking over diagnostics for the ship's systems and Tantalus core with a dejected slump in her shoulders.

"It's all right Tali, if a Cybran told someone else of the Loyalty Program and they said they didn't feel sorry for them, the Cybran would have gotten pretty angry, probably angrier than you did." John patted her on the shoulder "I trust you've gone through the two files I asked you to look over?"

"Yes, and now I understand why you said you could not feel much sympathy; we attacked the Geth like the Earth Empire struck out against the Seraphim and the Cybrans, with a pre-emptive strike… Like the UEF, we 'lost' the war to the 'Cybrans' in this relationship. But for your people, it was the firing of Black Sun that cemented the Cybrans as winners of the Infinite War, for mine, it was the escape of the Migrant Fleet and the eradication of almost all our population…" She shook her head "the parallels are stunning…"

"That they are, Tali… that they are…" Shepard was silent for a few moments. "Tali, I think it's time to get you some Coalition Marine-issue armour and fix up your suit… once you finish up with whatever you're doing, can you come with me to the cargo bay? It's the bottom deck, the one that has a part of it three full decks tall." Such was the height of the Rhino Medium Tank, 8 meters tall, that it required that amount of space. The cargo bay meant that the three decks that were bitten into were more like half-decks, with one section of each towards the back housing the quantum core, and one section towards the front housing simulators and machinery, namely the main mass fabricator and secondary power generators of the corvette, along with some Mass and Energy storage space. The Omni Sensor was housed in the forward section of the corvette, behind the forward Zapper and above the Dual Proton Cannon turret. The forward-most, overall pyramidal (a great deal more aesthetically pleasing than a simple pyramid, however) section of the ship contained one of the three shield emitters, the other two were toward the back to either side of the quantum core, which took up three decks in height, the Tantalus and support systems taking up the top four decks.

"I was only looking over some diagnostics, and it was for the third time to check for mistakes anyways, so I can come with you right away, it's not my shift right now, so Adams probably won't disagree with me leaving with you…"

* * *

"And now that we've gone through the UEF, Seraphim, and Cybran armours, let's proceed to the last set, which I think would suit you the most, the Aeon Illuminate's series of armours. The Light Aeon armour has the most upgrade options of any of the armours, allowing you to polarize towards any given set of values easily and thoroughly, though it is not all that good for a jack-of-all-trades. Medium Aeon, like the others, has an over-shield, and it is intermediate between the UEF and Cybran armours in durability, like all Aeon armours are, but it also has a vast arsenal of upgrades to choose from. The Heavy Aeon is again equipped with a large variety of upgrade options and it is the best at what it does, whatever the user decides that should be. The entire series of Aeon armours are noted fro their tech- and biotic-friendly nature, unlike the UEF series or any other Heavy armour. From this list, I would recommend you try out the Aeon Heavy, it's the same class Ashley uses, but hers is geared towards Combat, yours would probably be Tech-oriented considering your abilities, am I correct?" Shepard concluded, having gone through all twelve Coalition Armours "By the way, if you want to ask about the Drell, they developed along the Mass Effect Technology Line, so they generally either join the Coalition military or export the armour they themselves design to the rest of the galaxy, it's been under a few brands, namely Hydra, Onyx, and Colossus, all pretty decent in Council Space, but in Coalition Space, we use these four lines of armours, unless you're a merc, in which case you usually don't last long if you run afoul of the government, and don't last long regardless as long as you don't work for the government, as law enforcement can get you pretty fast, and there's very little need for mercs in Coalition Space anyways. Right, Ash?" Ashley Williams nodded absently, she had been standing around inspecting her armour and wondering if she should take it in for repairs.

"Can I test the weight of the armours? I want to make sure if there's an EMP and the armour stops supporting me with its systems I don't crush myself under the weight…" Tali said, contemplating the armours… Ashley pushed the torso piece of her armour toward Shepard, who picked it up with one hand.

"Sure, Here's Ashley's armour, test the weight…" Shepard handed Tali the torso piece of Ashley's armour as if it weighed nothing. Tali picked up the armour off his right arm, surprising herself at how much it weighed, she could feel the strain in her arms at lifting the piece, so she put it back down "Sorry, Shepard, I don't think I'll be able to handle a Heavy Armour, maybe a Medium?"

"Well, Kaidan uses Medium Aeon armour, so you can test that one's weight…" Shepard put Ashley's armour back in its owner's hands and called Kaidan down. It took only a few moments for the Lieutenant to arrive and remove his torso plates, handing the partly disassembled armour plates to Tali. "Well, Tali, how does that feel?"

"I think I would do better with Aeon Light Armour until I get enough physical training to handle this sort of weight…" It wasn't as heavy as the Aeon Heavy, but she knew by looking and omni-tool readings that if she tried to use the full suit without the internal systems being on, she'd probably be a slow, easy target. Little did she know that the suits were so hardened against EMPs and all sorts of EM radiation that they would reboot thirty seconds after a Cybran EMP nuke went off nearby, assuming they were not vaporized in the blast, and a Medusa Light Mobile Artillery's EMP effect would only render the internal systems immobile for ten seconds, IF it hit nearby.

"Alright, one Aeon Light Armour coming up, just a moment…" Shepard hit a button on his holographic interface, projected by his chest computer. "What upgrades do you want? It'll be better to nanolathed all of this in one run-through." He said, gesturing to the large platform that was raised slightly from the floor and slightly recessed into the forward wall of the cargo bay, with two elegantly curved prongs hanging out from the wall on either side, currently gently pulsing with energy and pointed toward one another, as if ready to begin working on something between them…

Tali's eyes widened as she saw the vast assortment of upgrades Aeon armour users had to choose from, projected from Shepard's left wrist, "There are so many…"

"Yep, that's why a lot of users like Aeon armour; it's easy to modify to suit a purpose, even though it does its purpose very well and doesn't leave much space for other purposes, just like most Aeon units." Shepard said, smiling, he didn't like wearing his helmet on ships, like almost all Marines. "So, whatever will you choose? Just to inform you, Aeon armour separates upgrades for upper and lower legs, arms and hands, and has two helmet upgrades, one on each side in addition to chest and back upgrades like the others. Individually, they are not as powerful as the arm, leg, or helmet upgrades for any of the others, but stacked together, they create a mighty opponent indeed. The other armours' upgrades are all geared towards balancing out abilities, the Aeon armour is all about boosting one ability set as much as possible while leaving enough space at the others to survive. Take your time, there's no rush, also, Tali, remember that all Coalition weapons, you'll be given what you choose, recharge/run off the suit's power core, so there's no real need for ammunition storage space in your upgrade choices."

* * *

Tali had chosen for her first set of upgrades, an Improved Interface System for the left hand, Improved Computing Capacity for the left arm, an Improved Recharge System for the right hand, and a Shield Attenuator for the right arm. For her lower leg armour upgrades she got a pair of Improved Articulators, which stacked up to give her a large boost in speed, though it would normally be used in short sprints to not tax the power core… speaking of that, she chose a Secondary Power Core upgrade for lower back, Improved Computing Capacity for chest, Improved Power Router for upper back, and Quantum Storage for her upper legs. For her helmet she chose an Improved Omni Sensor and a Tech Ability Range Booster. Once she had finalized her choices, she clicked "Finish" and the machinery before her and Shepard came to life. It had taken her just under twenty minutes to finalize her decisions, it took well under ten seconds for the nanolathe to finish her new armour.

"Your project has completed nanolathing." A computerized voice said.

She blinked as the machine's pedestal rolled forward slightly, indicating the project was done "That was faster than I had expected." She felt like she was almost blaspheming by such understatement, but that was life… She had expected to be asked to pick up her armour in a day or so, or perhaps the next time the Normandy docked at a Coalition Outpost, but this? This was almost ridiculous to the point of not even being funny. "How does nanolathing work?" She knew she sounded like a two-year-old in a candy shop, or what a two-year-old Quarian would have sounded like back on the Homeworld before the Geth Uprising, but she didn't care, there were just so many possibilities!

"You can ask Adams later, Tali, it's time to pick you some weapons, what will you choose this time?" Shepard was smiling warmly at her giddiness; it was pretty adorable, the way she was jouncing up and down, holding her three-fingered fists on either side of her helmet, as she excitedly babbled on about nanolathing technology and implications. He brought up the weapons selections and she immediately settled down, beginning to examine the specifications of the weapons.

* * *

"That's a good, well-balanced selection, Tali." Shepard nodded in approval. Tali had chosen a Phasic Shotgun, Laser Submachine Gun, Laser Pistol, and chose a Napalm Torch for her heavy weapon. She had decided, like Garrus and Wrex, that she would like to test the weapons in combat before adding any of the upgrades and enhancements the nanolathe had offered as options. Unlike them, she started off with upgraded armour, they both wanted to see the limits of their basic armour before adding upgrades to suit their needs. Tali knew what her needs would be from the technical data.

"Well, now that we are through with that, we can land on Therum and begin our quest… you ready, Tali, Wrex, and Garrus? Ashley, Kaidan, help Joker make sure our butts are covered. Joker, what's our ETA?"

"Ten minutes, Shepard, to the one ruin with an energy signature, should I drop the SCU?"

"Yeah, Kaidan and Ash can crew it and watch our asses, maybe even put up a small T3 base with a couple factories to cover us, should it become necessary… reclaim it afterwards."

"So, direct drop of the Rhino, Commander, not Restorer Lift?"

"Of course, Joker."

* * *

A/N: Now that most of the squad has been properly outfitted, it's time to demonstrate the power of Coalition Technology, on the planet known as Therum… (Btw: no worries, the Geth will actually be surprisingly tough, compared to what the Coalition expected… sort of. Later, Asari Commandos will in fact live up to their reputation as tough opponents, unlike in-game.)

How does a 25-meter tall Geth Colossus (around the size of a Hoplite T2 Assault Bot) and 10-meter Armatures sound?

Review please!


	13. Liara T'Soni

A/N: THIS IS IMPORTANT SO LISTEN UP

ALL COMMAND/CONSTRUCTION UNITS ARE OMNI. Say, a T3 Combat Engineer (a distinctly Cybran model) can construct a Seraphim Yolona Oss or a UEF Fatboy no problem. Same with the command units, so all commanders have equal access to Cybran EMP units/nukes and Yolona Oss/Mavor/Paragon structures.

I got the terms nanolathing, nanolathe, etc. from the fanfic by Dragonian: "Survival of the Fittest" on GPG (dot) net forums (under the Fanfiction/Role-play section of the supreme Commander section of the forums). That story is so freaking epic it defies words. You have not witnessed the God of fanfiction-writing until you have seen him at work (though AlbertG on this site comes pretty damned close in his A Universe of Change/Those Who Stand/Allies In Blood series and "A Thin Veneer")

* * *

Chapter 13: Liara T'Soni

_Therum, 31 May, 3868_

"Anderson said he didn't know much about the Artemis Tau Cluster as he'd never been there, but Therum is the only planet with Prothean ruins, so we'll probably find Liara T'Soni there." Shepard said to the three non-humans with him "This will be a good test of your armours and weapons, make use of it as such. Therum is volcanically active, while your armour's fields can survive immersion in lava for a minute or so, it is highly advised that you not try this."

"Opening hangar bay and disengaging hangar clamps, Commander, get ready to roll!" The SCU had been dropped already with Ashley and Kaidan inside, and was walking away from the ship while the hangar bay opened, the ground still a good fifty meters below the Rhino, according to the external cameras, then the 396-ton tank fell like a rock towards the ground, its crew experiencing a moment of weightlessness before the artificial gravity and inertial dampeners kicked in, settling them back to the floor before the tank landed.

A cloud of dust billowed up from the point of impact as the large war machine rolled out from its landing zone, barrelling along at sixty-six meters per second under guidance of its automated navigation system, swinging around boulders and lava streams at high speed. Inside, the non-Shepard occupants, even Wrex, gulped as one, and then stared at the man, who was grinning innocently.

"How much did you say this tank weighed again, Shepard?" Wrex was the first to speak.

"It weighs only 396 metric tons."

"Only? Wouldn't we have made a much bigger crater than we did coming down with so much mass?" Garrus was tapping his foot against the deck.

"All Coalition vehicles are fitted with inertial dampeners and gravity nullifiers that allow them to survive drops of anywhere up to three hundred meters, and often more. They are also fitted with advanced Combat and Navigation systems, as they are normally deployed as robotic armies. The Rhino Medium Tank has, as you may have noticed, changed much since the Infinite War, the tracks are less absurdly wide now and the hull is more attached to the turret, a major increase in structural integrity has been the result, also, a third particle cannon has been added. Anyways, let's go find ourselves an Asari…"

Silence reigned in the vehicle, before Joker called in "Commander, I'm picking up some readings, like, a whole swarm of them, a few klicks north of your position."

"Got it, Joker, will proceed to investigate immediately. Shepard Out." John said, laying back in his comfortable seat and using the console's right click to order the tank to move closer to the location highlighted on the strategic map. It was almost video-game like, a grey triangular icon showed up on the radar, indicating an unknown aircraft moving toward them from ahead. The Normandy's sensors were showing a mass of land units to the far north, as well as the air unit.

Two squares, tilted 45 degrees, aka diamonds, showed two unknown land units deposited up to the north, which the Rhino was quickly approaching. Within seconds, they had turned to the flattened hexagons indicative of bots, as the Rhino entered visual range. Shepard held fire for a moment "What are those things?"

"They're Geth Armatures, a decent armour vehicle by Citadel Standards, probably no threat to this tank though, try it out, see what happens." Tali said, shrugging once she finished. Two bright pulses were fired from the distant targets, and the Rhino swerved, easily dodging the rounds.

"Okay, screw possible negotiations then, weapons free!" Shepard selected the option on the console, and the Rhino's turret, already lined up (and staying lined up throughout the Rhino's evasive pattern, which was rarely used in the Infinite War due to round speeds…) on one of the Armatures, opened fire.

Three beams of light, cycling every half a second, linked the vehicles together for moments at each burst. Two bursts later, half a second after the Rhino began firing, the first Armature' shields flickered, another burst blew the shields apart, scorching the armour. The fourth burst cut through the machine and blew it to bits; even before it could fire a second pulse of whatever weapon it used.

Shepard had stopped the Rhino's evasive pattern to test the power of the enemy's weapons. Before the second Armature's shields went down, it let out a pulse of light that impacted the Rhino's over-shield.

"Hmm, not bad, 20 shield points lost, that's 10 DPS for these things, not bad at all…" Shepard stated before the Rhino's guns reduced the Armature to melted and scorched metal. "Too bad we have 900 Structural Integrity, 300 Over-shield and 108 DPS…compared to them."

"Shepard, by your system of points, about how much does a Turian Landcruiser have? And what numbers are you entering for Geth Armatures?"

"Turian Landcruisers are rated at 120 Shields plus Health, and a Geth Armature I'm rating 160 shields and 30 Health based on weapon observations." John turned to Tali, who was reading the user's manual of the Rhino "Tali, are there tougher Geth?"

"Well, there's Geth Colossi, they might actually pose some threat to this tank, because their siege pulses are just so much more powerful and their shields and armour so much more durable." She replied as the Rhino navigated itself around the narrow path that was clear of lava.

"Turrets, up ahead!" Garrus called as he noticed something on the cameras at roughly the same time Shepard noticed them on the strategic display. A trio of turrets outside a small compound came into view, and they fired rockets at the Rhino's path. He disliked driving across lava due to the damage it would do to structural fields, so he ploughed on toward the open area on the other side of this lava field chokepoint. The three rockets all impacted the shields, each doing 30 damage to the shields, putting the shield of the vehicle to a little over 200 (regen at 4/sec) "I'm not sure a direct frontal attack would be a great strategy, Shepard, those things fire fairly quickly…" indeed, another volley of rockets had impacted the shields before the Rhino made it to open terrain and begun evasive manoeuvres. The particle cannons, effectively lasers, had already blown one of the turrets to scrap, but still Shepard didn't want to tax the shield recharge too much. Unlike the Obsidian Medium Tank (Aeon, though like the Ilshavoh it is about twice as effective as the Pillar or Rhino… it's about twice the cost), the Rhino (Cybran) did not come with a standard shield; the Over-shield was an upgrade and mainly meant to be sacrificial to protect the vehicle while entering combat, not to quickly recharge even in battle…

"There must be another way around; I don't think we should test the effects of Geth weapons on your structural fields and armour, Shepard." Tali commented as another turret was blown apart, the over-shield of the Rhino dropping a little below half its initial value of 300 points, slowly recharging, as it absorbed yet another rocket's explosive energy.

"Hang on, we'll take these things out first, I saw a pass a bit back that we can probably get through, according to terrain scans it loops around behind this Geth outpost… we can flank them that way… there, it's gone, let's move." Shepard set up a waypoint route for the Rhino before laying back "Guys, I'll need to train you guys on manual handling and normal handling of this vehicle sometime, but now is not the time."

* * *

Garrus, after a long, comfortable silence, was first to speak up "That turret was easy." Indeed, five bursts, 270 points worth of firepower, and the lone turret in the back of the Geth base had gone down, just like the three in the front of the Geth outpost. "So were the Geth troops."

The Rhino had essentially parked outside the Geth encampment and Shepard had taken over the turret controls manually, since the assigned target interface system was too difficult to pinpoint smaller targets, the holographic control interface allowed for better micro work. This was not to say the power containment units the Rhino smashed with its particle cannons, firing one at a time to allow for higher overall rate of fire, were small (thus requiring micro). This was similar to how the Heavy Proton Cannons on Galaxy-class Battlecruisers, formerly the Cybran T3 Battleship, fire at targets.

The Geth Troopers that were outside the compound were no problem for the Rhino, dealing almost no damage to the massive tank before being mowed down by cyclic fire of the three particle cannons (yielding a total of six beams per second) The Shock Troopers only managed to register any damage to the over-shield by use of Carnage shotgun shots and cover, and the Geth Destroyers did similarly before being cut down. It actually took two shots in a row to take down a Destroyer, and a direct hit to take down a Shock Trooper, much to the surprise of Shepard's crew, Shepard because of their resistance and the rest because of the immense power of the guns, even firing individually.

The Rocket Troopers and lone Juggernaut were the only things that even came close to being a threat to the Rhino, their Disruptor Rockets, for the ones at closer ranges, dealing significant damage to the over-shield, and the Scram Rockets dealing some more. Shepard's response was to being moving the tank around to dodge the rockets. The Rocket Troopers were cut down with one shot each, but the Juggernaut took three hits to take down, and actually managed to score a hit against the hull of the Rhino.

"Shepard, are you sure this absurdly durable tank is standard-issue in the Coalition? You're making me inclined to pinch myself to see if I'm dreaming of the fall of the Geth again…" Tali had said, looking at the tank's structural fields and shield readouts, indicating some 876 HP, slowly regenerating at a rate of one per second, and 150 over-shield, regenerating, now that the shield had been taken down, at a rate of 15/sec, Shepard had chosen not to switch it on at that point, electing to wait for the full regen.

"The only upgrade from the basic Rhino is the over-shield; I didn't even put the Ablative Armour, Enhanced Self-Repair, Crystalline Refractors, Improved Transmission System or Hardened Over-Shield on this ride yet, though judging by these Geth actually managing to penetrate the shields, they're going into this thing, right away."

"Further upgrading such a killing machine? That sounds a bit extraneous, Shepard." Wrex commented. "Let's get into the outpost, shall we?"

"Sure, once the shields are recharged… Garrus, would you car to go topside and snipe those two Geth in the gatehouses? I'm sure you're bored…"

"Why him?" Wrex said, crossing his arms "I'm a Krogan, remember, I get even more bored without any action."

Garrus waved his LBR in front of Wrex's face "This thing can in fact snipe, Wrex, unlike your weapons… never mind." He added, once Wrex drew his Infantry Nanodart Launcher, raising one brow ridge questioningly.

"Alright, Wrex, you go instead, Garrus, you'll get your turn."

One Nanodart (complete with Direct-link visual guidance) per now-flaming gatehouse later, nearly four hundred tons of Rhino Medium Tank crashed through the gates, stopping in the middle of the compound "Everybody out!" The four leapt down from the back plates of the tank after leaving via the airlock there. "Scour the compound for anything useful, Tali, with me, Garrus, Wrex, try not to kill each other."

"Alright, Shepard." The two moved off to the left half of the compound (relative to the Rhino's heading and the entrance of the compound…) while Tali and Shepard moved to the right. Several crates and weapons lockers (which were reclaimed for possible future sale for credits) later, they heard Wrex and Garrus ambushing some Geth over the radio. The engagement lasted mere moments with the weapons of the Coalition pitted against Geth infantry armour. Shepard and Tali encountered nothing on their side except some gate controls for the far gate, which Shepard ignored; it was very, very unlikely that the Rhino would not be able to roll through the gate.

"Shepard, I found something" it was a crate, lying next to a tire, that needed decryption, Tali set about doing the job while Shepard covered her. "It seems that the Geth have found Liara T'Soni in the Prothean ruins to the north and are planning on taking her to Saren… we can't let that happen."

Shepard was right about one thing, the Rhino bulldozed through the far gate with no trouble whatsoever, further along the clear path to the north was another pair of Armatures, to the west, two more Armatures bombarded the group from across a lava pool. Shepard ordered the turret to open fire on the two walkers across the pool while he manually guided the Rhino to drive straight at the two Armatures ahead.

The ten-meter-tall walker tried its best to dodge the 8-meter tall tank; however it was not nearly fast enough, unlike Coalition units (namely the Mantis T1 Light Armour, a similar four-legged Bot that served as the Cybran equivalent of a Light tank), and thus got rolled under the tank's tracks in a fraction of a second. The walker simply shut down as three hundred and ninety-six tons of metal moving at sixty-six meters per second, or two hundred thirty-seven point six kilometres per hour, rolled over its frame, utterly crushing it.

The next Armature met a similar end under the Rhino's mighty tracks as the cannons of the tank finished off the two that were across the pool of lava. The shield of the tank was still nearly full when it rounded a rock outcrop and sighted the next enemy, a much larger version of what seemed to be an Armature, escorted by a number of Geth Troopers and Geth Rocket Troopers. "That's a Geth Colossus, a sub-category of the Geth Armature, but much more powerful and heavily armoured, I'm not sure it would be safe to take it on directly…"

Shepard had stopped the tank, taking the siege pulse the Colossus put out directly to the shields "hmm, 40 damage, not bad, that's something like 40 DPS, let's see how strong its shields are… 25 meters tall, like a Hoplite Medium Assault Bot in height, not bad, not bad at all…" He opened fire as the Colossus opened up with its secondary machine guns.

The Rhino deftly dodged the rockets fired by the Troopers and some of the Colossus' siege pulses, but enough still hit to deplete the shields at about the same time the Colossus' shields fell. "So that's about 500 shield points… pretty nice vehicle, for a non-Coalition race." And in a few more bursts, the Colossus brewed up. "About 200 Health, not bad, that's enough for it to count as a Tier 1.5 unit in the Coalition." The Rhino then ran back around the bend as its shields recharged and its hull slowly self-repaired.

"That was the fastest Colossus kill I have ever seen with land weapons, even from our history documentaries" Tali said while shunting more power to the shields instead of the drive system, boosting the recharge rate. Once the recharge was complete, the Rhino rounded the bend again, speeding toward the Geth troops taking cover behind various rocks and firing at it. It ran over the Geth, backed up over more, and ran over more, firing its Particle Cannons at the ones that ran for better cover. In mere moments the Geth group was cut down, the Rhino's hull was still around 850 Structural Integrity (and slowly repairing), and its shields was still fairly high.

They noted the tunnel and Shepard measured it using the tank's sensor suite "The Rhino won't fit, everybody out, the Restorer from the Normandy will pick the tank up. We're heading into that tunnel. I'll take point."

"Shepard, I just figured out why we don't carry a complement of Mech Marines, organic Marines are a lot better at fitting into places." Tali said, looking between the gigantic tank and the tunnel entrance.

Advancing into the tunnel, they found a pair of Rocket Troopers, "Garrus, on three, snipe the one on the left, I'll take the one on the right." Shepard deployed the LBR into its sniper configuration.

"Gotcha." Garrus did the same to his LBR

"One, Two, Three" Two bolts of red light flashed momentarily in the dark interior of the tunnel, and the two head lights of the Geth winked out.

"Good shot, Tali, your Omni Sensor detect anything?" Shepard looked at the Quarian behind him.

"The Omni Sensor reads two contacts up ahead, eight hundred meters distance."

"Good, squad, advance." They raced down the tunnel, using their armour's pneumatics and hydraulics to boost their speed to twenty meters per second in the empty tunnel, half a minute later, Garrus and Shepard once again took down two Geth Rocket Troopers. They then crossed an open area between two small mountains and entered another tunnel. Halfway down the tunnel, they spotted another two Rocket Troopers, this time, they elected to let Tali practice her hacking, making one of the Geth draw its pulse rifle and open fire on the other, which went down before it could destroy its attacker with its own pulse rifle. A blast from Tali's Phasic Shotgun ended the hacked Rocket Trooper's existence.

A group of rocket Troopers and a few standard Troopers were hanging around the other end of the tunnel, in the open area before a myriad of rock outcroppings. Wrex's ULPA (Ultra-Light Phasic Autogun) and Tali's LSMG (Laser SMG) took them down quickly and effectively, while Shepard and Garrus provided LBR support. They advanced through the clearing and toward a narrow gap in the rock barrier that surrounded the clearing, static beginning to wash over the radar of Shepard, Wrex, and Garrus.

"Tali, patch your Omni Sensor data feed to us, if you don't mind." The radar screens cleared up again, as Omni Sensors could cut through any form of jamming, even Cloaking, and they saw the Geth that were arrayed a short distance beyond the rock barrier. "Wrex, get your Sonic Pulse Shotgun ready, Tali, use your Phasic Shotgun, Garrus, go PSMG (Phasic SMG), I'll use my GLMG, remember to use cover, your shields are far better than you're probably used to but they're NOT invincible. Tali, make sure you're ready to deploy tech mines, overloads, sabotage and hacking."

"Can do, Shepard." She typed in the command prompts and left her left arm's suit computers to process the logarithms and to prepare them for launch via her left hand's Improved Interface, and grasped her Shotgun in her right hand, nesting it into the crook of her elbow and locking her armour into place to support it. She grabbed a tech mine from her right upper leg's Quantum Storage and prepped it, clipping it to the left side of her belt. The rest of her mines were mostly on her left side, so it made sense that for the one you had extra time to prepare for, you would prepare the one that was hardest to draw and prep normally. "Ready" She said, along with the other two.

"Alright, I'll cloak and flank them, once I open fire, rush through, and Tali, you throw the Tech Mine at the largest concentration of Geth before Garrus runs for it, then you go through after him, understand? Wrex, you follow her, the last one through is usually the one that gets shot at most and doles out the most return fire, you said back on the Normandy that you liked that role." The team nodded to him, and so Shepard activated his Cybran Heavy armour's personal cloaking system and moved out, quickly crossing the space between the gap in the rock barrier and the Geth line.

Once he was near the back of the line, he moved behind a Geth Shock Trooper and opened fire into the back of the machine, from inside its barriers, with his Laser Pistol in his left hand. The bolt punched into the Geth's head and burned out its core processors, then Shepard immediately caught the falling Geth with his left arm and opened fire with his Gauss LMG, propped up on the Dead Geth's shoulder. The other Geth, alerted to his presence not by their dead comrade but by the blazing of his Light Machine Gun, opened fire at his position. The dead Shock Trooper soaked up their bullets and pulse rifle rounds while Garrus dashed from the gap in the rock barrier, strafing the Geth line and ducking behind a large rock.

Tali's tech mine landed in the midst of the largest concentration of Geth troops and detonated, dropping their shields, allowing Wrex and Garrus's volley of Phasic rounds to cut them down while Shepard whittled down the second largest group with intense fire from his Gauss Light Machine Gun. Tali's Phasic Shotgun and Laser SMG, along with Overload, AI Hacking, and Sabotage cleared out the few Geth units outside the two main groups. When the dust settled, none of the group had even lost their over-shields, Tali wasn't even close to losing her shields.

"Alright, crew, Garrus, keep watch. Wrex, Tali, Reclaim anything that might come in useful, use your armour's Reclaim function, we need to be quick about this, if there's this much Geth presence they most likely already got to Dr. T'Soni…" Within two minutes, the area had been cleared of anything that could be sold for credits, and the four proceeded onward.

* * *

"Sniper!" Tali called as a round bounced harmlessly off her over-shield, and ducked behind cover. Shepard, Wrex, and Garrus had been temporarily distracted by a small army of Geth Troopers and Rocket Troopers popping out of alcoves in the rock walls of this basin-like area, she had taken the hit without trouble, though she suspected that had she not been given this new armour, her brains would have been splattered all over the ground behind her cooling corpse already.

"Wrex, use a Throw on that sniper!" Shepard called, dispatching yet another Rocket Trooper with a GLMG burst to the face. In the squad's current target-rich environment, an LBR would not have had the sustained firing rate he needed. Wrex was apparently thinking along the same lines, dual-wielding his GSMG and Sonic Pulse Shotgun while Garrus took up the ULPA. Tali had been offering support with Tech abilities, up until the sniper had shot at her.

"Can do, Shepard" Wrex clipped his shotgun to his belt (a temporary position due to its hampering movement), drew his left hand back, and threw it forward, projecting a mass effect field, concentrated by the Quantum Attenuators he had fitted in that arm, up at the sniper's post. The machine, hit on the shoulder by the blast, spun around and fell off the tower into the basin, not getting back up anytime before Judgement Day.

"Sniper is down, repeat, sniper is down!"

"Shepard, requesting permission to close in on the concentration of Rocket Troopers" A group of rocket troopers behind cover had formed a sort of firing line that held the four at bay for now.

"Do you have your flamethrower equipped? If so, go for it, we'll cover you, make sure you have enough energy to sprint back though" The three laid down a withering field of fire before Tali deployed a wide spread Sabotage on the enemy. She then used most of her remaining energy reserves to supercharge her leg actuators, sprinting forward toward the Geth group, hidden behind a semi-circular enclosure of rocks.

She vaulted over it while firing up her flamethrower, bathing the nearest pair of Geth Rocket Troopers in fire, destroying them before they could draw and fire their Pulse Rifles at her. A third Rocket Trooper got her flamethrower's nozzle to its optic, along with a healthy dose of napalm. The rest began to fire on her, but her shields were too strong for them to have any hope of overcoming so quickly, before they too were turned into either scrap—one of the pluses of Advanced Articulators for a leg, or in her case lower leg, armour upgrade—or funeral pyres.

Once she finished off the Geth, she turned her attention to where Shepard, Wrex and Garrus had finally broken through the other Geth line, due to no longer having to avoid fire from their left side. She reclaimed anything and everything valuable nearby for Shepard, as she'd quickly learned was his style, and moved over to join them, switching her weapon for her Phasic Shotgun. The main reason the UPLA was distinct from it was the fact that it had a much higher rate of fire and much higher muzzle velocity. The two weapons were essentially matched in damage per period of time otherwise, the only major difference being round speed. She blasted the last Geth Shock Trooper with the shotgun, ending the struggle in the basin.

"Shall we proceed? How did you do, Tali? Need Wrex's Restoration Field?"

"I'm fine, let's go and find ourselves this Asari…"

* * *

"Well, the base is up." Ashley commented, looking at the display, which showed a T3 Land Factory, a T3 Air Factory, three T3 Mass Extractors (Resources from surrounding rocks was required for that task…) surrounded by Mass Storages, a T3 Power Generator, an Athanuhthe T3 Heavy Shield Generator and an Omni Sensor. A group of four T1 Power Generators increasing the power efficiency of the Omni Sensor made the base very much self-sufficient in power, the surplus power generation and the generation capacity of the SCU would provide for any power required in the manufacturing of units. "Has Shepard called for any support yet?"

"No, so we aren't supposed to build any units, and we won't build any. What do you propose we do to pass the time, cards?" Kaidan pulled a pack out from one of his Aeon Medium armour's compartments.

"Sure, I don't see why not… I don't get why Shepard wanted us to come together on this job anyways, either of us could have done this on our own… even though I have no idea why you had to use an Aeon model for the factories and Omni, a Cybran model for the mass extractors, UEF models for the power generators, and all with a Seraphim SCU"

"Maybe he wanted us to build a closer bond? I mean, we were pretty chummy with Jenkins back before he lost half a leg…" Kaidan said slowly, dealing the cards.

"Maybe…"

* * *

"Shepard, your Coalition's Marine armour and weapons are slightly on the ridiculous side of things." Tali said, looking down at her Phasic Shotgun, which had just blown a Geth Trooper completely to pieces in one shot. Normally, at least in her experience, two blasts were required, and that was to kill the thing, not make the limbs and head all go flying in different directions!

"As the humans say, Quarian, 'Hallelujah, tell us something we don't know'." Wrex commented dryly as they walked towards the entrance to the ruins.

"This Quarian had a name, say it with me, Ta-Li, Tali, got it?"

"How would you make me call you by your name?"

"I have a flamethrower…" She was palming it, as if testing its weight.

"I like this one's way of doing things, Shepard. Alright, Quarian, I'll call you Tali from now on, but please do try to remember in the future that threatening something that outweighs you, enviro-suit and all, by at least three times isn't wise…"

"You do realize that at present, you outweigh me only by one time?"

Garrus, on the other side of Tali from Wrex, groaned and facepalmed, to which Wrex said "Impressive, _you_ actually made the Turian facepalm."

"I told you I could take anything metal and make it do stuff it wouldn't normally do" Tali looked at Wrex, pointedly, well, pointing her thumb over her shoulder at Garrus, then turned to him, poking him in the chest with the middle (pointer) finger of her left hand "and Garrus, before saying you shouldn't be teased for your metallic skin, please remember the debate we had about the Quarian situation. You deserved what you got." Tali crossed her arms smugly as they walked toward the ruins, Shepard in the lead, shaking his head and smiling at his squad's banter.

They passed under a catwalk and a deep rumbling emerged from the background noise of the ruins and nearby volcanic activity. A Geth Dropship dropped two snipers and two shock troopers behind the group, causing Tali to raise her eyebrow at the meagre force. Then a loud crash and an unfurling block of metallic grey announced the arrival of an Armature. The squad without a word ran for cover, a laser beam passing through where Garrus had been a moment ago. Tali traced it to its origin, an odd-looking Geth hanging on the underside of the catwalk "Shepard, Geth above us! I don't recognize it!" She shouted as she opened fire on the Geth, which began hopping around, dodging her slow-moving shotgun rounds, she switched to her LSMG and finally blew it to bits in a couple of hits, she noted another one jumping toward her and ducked under it, kicking it up into the air before unhooking her flamethrower from her waist and bathing it in a burst of fire, burning it to a crisp before it returned to the ground as a lump of charred metal.

While Tali was dealing with the Hoppers, as Shepard had decided to term them, Garrus had taken down the two Snipers by, unsurprisingly, sniping. Wrex had demolished the shock troopers with a volley of ULPA fire, and now all that was left was the Armature, which Shepard had fired on for quite a while with his own Nanodart Launcher and Ionized Plasma Rifle. The squad focused fire on it, avoiding its siege pulses, until the machine finally went down as a ball of ionized plasma tore into its guts.

Finally, the area was cleared (of all valuables as well as hostiles), and the path into the ruin was laid bare… Rather, the tunnel into the ruin was laid bare. Shepard's team advanced into the tunnel toward a catwalk near the end, which was just after an open area with a few containment cells sitting around.

Suddenly, Garrus ducked, deploying his LBR into sniper mode as he yelled "Snipers! Three of them!" Wrex and Tali also immediately ducked behind crates and blocks of anything large enough to serve as cover. Shepard back-pedalled as Geth emerged from the corners of the open area and from behind the power cells. He smiled at their positioning.

"Hello, boys, welcome to hell…" He let loose with a long burst of his GLMG, sweeping across the Geth ranks, it was not meant to penetrate their shields or armour, as they were all Shock Troopers. Instead, it set off a chain reaction among the energy containment cells. Tali's Omni sensor data provided all the Intel the group needed to cut down the two remaining Shock Troopers in the smoke.

Once the smoke had dissipated, the group walked down the catwalk, only to be met with a force field that blocked their way and appeared impenetrable to their weapons. Shepard shrugged and pointed to the elevator next to them "guess we take the elevator, then."

The ancient piece of machinery appeared safe to Tali's Omni Sensor (its range is only about 500 meters Omni but can pick up radar signatures from up to 2 kilometres), and surprisingly, it actually worked, for one whole level before it stopped and let the squad out onto the next level "Keep an eye out, if that elevator is that visible from here, there's probably something between us and it." Shepard looked around "Tali, go pick up that package of medi-gel, we might need it at some point, Garrus, cover her."

"Can do, Shepard" The Turian kept an eye out behind the team as the Quarian packed the medi-gel she'd found into her thigh Quantum Storage spaces. Once she'd finished, the whole group moved forward.

"Geth Assault Drones! Three below us!" there wasn't much cover on the catwalk, but then again the squad's shields could take a lot of punishment, and their weapons could kick a lot of Geth ass, so the three Assault Drones proved no trouble for the well-armed expedition. "That could have gone faster" was Shepard's only comment as the four piled into the elevator, this one considerably smaller than the first.

"Wrex, can you stand on your tiptoes?" Garrus asked in a muffled voice, being up against the wall.

"Sorry, Garrus, can't…" Wrex actually sounded apologetic, it was one of the few minor flaws of Seraphim Heavy armour, it made you taller than you were.

The elevator emitted some sparks from its console and began to make screeching noises as the squad went further down. "Uh oh." Shepard said, blinking his helmet lights, as the elevator became stuck.

"Wrex, judging by how you're squishing me—oomph—the elevator probably went down too fast with you in it and it activated the emergency braking system…" Garrus said sarcastically.

"Well, the door's opening, at least, uh oh…" Shepard finished slowly, as he and Tali ended up tumbling out of the elevator as soon as the doors opened wide enough, when Garrus, trying to make some room to breathe in, pushed Wrex, surprisingly for Garrus, this time, Wrex's frame actually moved…. The net result was Tali and Shepard being pushed to the floor outside the elevator doors. Okay, that was annoying, let's move." He said as he got back up, Wrex picking Tali up and setting her upright next to him.

The next area consisted of a series of platforms with interconnecting stairs, with the gentle glow a force field on the other side of a corner. Tali's Omni Sensor detected only one contact, and it wasn't a Geth signature, as instead of a grey diamond it showed a grey humanoid figure, so it was an organic contact.

* * *

Liara T'Soni was scared, tired, hungry, thirsty, and sure she would die here, her skeleton suspended in this field, until it was discovered by other archaeologists. She could barely move her head to look behind her, suspended as she was in the curtain, and she was worried about the Geth and that Krogan finding a way past the curtain and getting to her. She couldn't even wipe away the tears that were gathering in her eyes. She was wondering why they had stayed around for her in the first place when she heard the discharge of Geth pulse weaponry somewhere above and in front of her, along with faint buzzing noises, staccato roars and rapid "pew pew" noises. Someone was fighting the Geth; she hoped it was someone friendly…

"Hello? Hello? Is anyone there? I need help… please, can anyone hear me? I need help!" She decided to risk it despite a nagging fear of something worse than the Geth.

The elevator that was to her front and left along the corridor emitted a shower of sparks and screeched to a halt before a pair of loud thuds were heard, then a series of steady footsteps of metal on metal. She feared that it was the Geth who, after prevailing over her would-be rescuers, had found a way around the curtain and come down to kill her.

The two ominous red lights that rounded the corner in front of her made her gulp in fear that something worse than the Geth had arrived. The two red lights, like eyes, bobbed up and down with every step (and soft clank of metal on metal) of the mysterious figure as it stepped into the light of the Prothean field, a suit of angular, matte black armour coming into view, holding a large, deadly-looking rifle which Liara had never seen the likes of before. Her eyes travelled up to the figure's helmet, observing the two grooves along the face beneath the glowing red eyes, and the absence of a nose on the helmet. She noted the jagged spires sticking out from behind the helmet and the back of the armour, and then she noticed three other sets of lights coming up behind the menacing figure.

One had two massive shoulder towers, outlined in soft yellow circuitry, incorporated into the upper arms, with two small yellow eyes and a round circle below and between them, as if to symbolize a mouth. The helmet of that one extended far above the face, almost reminding her of a Krogan's hump. A second figure had two glowing blue slits for eyes and was in dull grey armour. The third, however, was most ominous, bright green eyes, in two columns of three each, regarded the Asari, faint green circuitry outlining the entire torso piece of the dull bone-white armour.

The black one, apparently the leader, held up a fist, and the other three stopped, the leader clipped its rifle to its side before moving its hands to its helmet and removing it. The head that was revealed looked surprisingly like that of a Quarian male from before the Geth Uprising, according to what she remembered of the history documentaries she'd watched. She was puzzled, since when did the Quarians have such armours? Since when could the Migrant Fleet afford such different-looking armours?

"Hello, my name is Shepard, who are you?" Liara suddenly remembered one particular news broadcast she'd actually caught, two years ago, about contact being made with a few new species, the Humans and the Seraphim being chief among them. It was then that it was revealed the Drell homeworld had somehow recovered, and the Drell on Kahje could go back to their homeworld, Rakhana. The news broadcasts focused on the humans, who looked astoundingly similar to Quarians, other than the five digits per limb, their females looked very much like Asari, except for the presence of hair. She'd paid it no heed at the time, but she had to admit that she found this human, for that was what he was sure he was, very intriguing, even if it was just a gut feeling.

"Oh thank the Goddess, I didn't expect anyone to come looking for me… I'm Liara T'Soni, I was doing a dig here when we got attacked by the Geth, I escaped and managed to hide behind this barrier curtain, but I must have pressed something I wasn't supposed to, so now I'm stuck in this field and can hardly move, can you help get me out? Please?" Liara noticed how pathetic and pleading her own voice sounded, but she didn't care, she just wanted to live…

"We'll find a way around or through, Garrus, Tali, look around for anything that could help us through to her, Wrex, watch my back, thanks." The human, Shepard, said motioning to his team. Then he turned back toward her, and after a brief pause began speaking "Which side are you on? We have confirmed intel that your mother is working with Saren."

* * *

John Shepard had never quite been struck dumb by women before, and he never expected any human woman to render him even temporarily incapable of speech… So why was it that he was completely devoid of words from the moment he rounded the corner until he was almost right in front of this Asari scientist? _Oh, right, she's not "any human woman" you idiot!_ His brain berated itself inside his head. He had to take off his helmet to assure himself his optics hadn't been hacked by Joker, who'd pasted something from the intro of one of Joker's favourite movies (incidentally, none of said movies were appropriate for children) onto the display feeds when he wasn't looking, because what he was looking at was simply… inhumanly beautiful, literally. He finally said probably the least intelligent-sounding thing he'd said since he was three years of age: "Hello, my name is Shepard, who are you?"

"Oh thank the Goddess, I didn't expect anyone to come looking for me… I'm Liara T'Soni, I was doing a dig here when we got attacked by the Geth, I escaped and managed to hide behind this barrier curtain, but I must have pressed something I wasn't supposed to, so now I'm stuck in this field and can hardly move, can you help get me out? Please?" The blue… vision before him spoke in what sounded better than what would be described as an angelic voice; it sounded pleading and panicked, _as would be expected from a scientist fearing for her life_. That was what the N7 Marine part of his brain said, the part that was simply a man said something very much simpler: _Save her, NOW!_

"We'll find a way around or through, Garrus, Tali, look around for anything that could help us through to her, Wrex, watch my back, thanks." John Shepard said as a stopgap measure so that he could come up with something marginally more intelligent. He did not know why he was nearly struck dumb like this; she wasn't THAT exquisite-looking from an objective point of view, maybe it was just a random mood swing thing? But wasn't that the territory of Biotics, especially L1 Biotics like Kaidan? _And why the hell do I suddenly want to pull out my laser pistol and shoot myself in the foot for blaspheming, for thinking she wasn't that exquisite? _"Which side are you on? We have confirmed intel that your mother is working with Saren."

"Benezia?" Liara sounded… surprised? "I haven't talked to my mother for several years, I'm not on anyone's side. I just want to get out of this thing alive!" She sounded sincere (not to mention scared), and she didn't seem to be armed, so Shepard was inclined to believe her, after all, the Coalition armour was so heavy that Biotics would not do much anyways.

"Shepard! We found a mining laser over here!" Tali called, after a series of shotgun blasts, flamethrower bursts, and more than a few sniper shots from Garrus's LBR cleared the area to the right of the barrier curtain.

"I'm coming, Tali! Liara, we'll get you out in a moment, don't worry." Shepard grinned at her before putting his helmet back on and jogging, along with Wrex, out of view.

"Wait, there are more Geth! They're lead by a Krogan!" She called after them, receiving a faint "Thanks!" in reply.

* * *

"I just hope I wasn't somehow hallucinating…" Liara mumbled to herself once Shepard and Wrex had disappeared from view. It wasn't implausible, considering her starved, dehydrated and tired state. No doubt had Shepard's team arrived a few days later they would have found only her bloated corpse suspended in the field… She still didn't get why Benezia working with Saren was such a bad thing… wasn't Saren a Spectre? She remembered the Turian, one of the ones with an actually understandable sense of humour, befriending her mother some thirty years ago, why was this group then hunting him? And why did he send Geth of all things after her? Her musings were interrupted by a loud rumbling behind her, the sound of an elevator, then the clunking of boots once more.

She twisted her head around to her left and saw, out of the corner of her eye, Shepard's crew march into the chamber she was in from an elevator. Shepard spoke again, this time through the speakers of his helmet "So, Liara, how can we get you down?"

"The control console is over there, on my left, I think the button I pressed had a circle and dash on it… that fired up the containment field. I believe you need only press it again to dissipate the field." She said to the man.

Shepard was slightly intrigued by the button in question, it was red, round, and had a circle with an open top and a vertical dash protruding through the gap, mostly inside the circle. Overall, it looked absurdly like the typical "On/Off" button found on the extreme majority of appliances and/or tools found in Coalition Space, and this was a Prothean console? Regardless, he pressed it, and the field around Dr. T'Soni dissipated in the space of a second, and she began to fall from where she was suspended.

Liara had just realized that she might be in danger of hurting herself when she started to fall. She braced for impact but instead found herself caught by a pair of armoured arms, which recoiled with her weight, so they didn't hurt as they supported her head, back and under her knees. "Can you walk, Miss T'Soni?"

"I've been stuck in that barrier for four days, with barely any water and no food, I don't think I'll be walking anywhere for now…" Indeed, the immense effort of lifting her water bottle to her lips several times over the last few days had been exhausting, fighting the barrier with all she had to prolong her life if only for a little while. She could only put her arms around the man's neck to help stabilize herself with what strength she had left after drinking the last of her water. It was good that the field had a waste removal system…

There was another low rumble that shook the chamber "These ruins are not entirely stable, the mining laser must have triggered a seismic event…" The group piled into the elevator, fortunately large enough for all five of them, and it rose toward the top level.

"Joker, get a ride to our position ASAP! We need immediate evac from the ruins!" Shepard shouted over his suit's comm. system. "Well be alright, Liara, Joker and either the Normandy or the Restorer will be there to pick us up topside."

The elevator finally reached the top level and the crew, especially Wrex, helped the door open up with some force. "Hand over the doctor, Saren wants her, and he gets what he wants."

"You're not getting anything from me." Liara said tiredly, glaring at the Krogan from her position in Shepard's arms.

"She comes with us, move aside or you go down with these ruins." Shepard said, making his red eye-lights flare up in threat.

"Heh, that'll just make it more interesting." The Krogan said. "Spare the doctor if you can, if not, it doesn't matter."

Wrex fired a moment after the Geth Rocket Trooper on the other side did, the scram missile impacted cleanly on Wrex's shields and blew away the over-shield in one hit, dealing slight damage to the shield itself. The Geth Rocket Trooper was not as fortunate, Wrex's Sonic Pulse Shotgun blast tearing it apart like wet toilet paper.

Tali opened fire on the relatively powerful shields of the Krogan, as did Garrus, her first two Phasic Shotgun and Garrus's two Sniper Mode LBR rounds did not penetrate, but her last Phasic Shotgun slug blew a hole out of the Krogan's armour before he could take Wrex's shield down. In the meantime, Wrex had taken down the two Geth Troopers and a Geth Shock Trooper, and had begun firing toward the other Krogan. The final shotgun round the Krogan got off, right after firing an overload pulse at Wrex that took out the last of his shields, splattered harmlessly against the structural fields of Wrex's armour. This was just before Wrex fired his Shotgun into the face of the enemy.

In the meantime, Shepard had ducked behind cover with Liara, and was about to put her down when he noticed the red targeting laser dot settle over her chest. He instinctively swerved and took the overpowered Geth Pulse Sniper Rifle shot to his over-shield.

* * *

Liara's eyes had widened as she witnessed the overcharged—she knew the signs from her training as a youngster—sniper slug streak through the air to impact the back of her saviour, Shepard. She had never seen anyone, even armoured, withstand such a shot without mortal damage if not immediate death, but the shield bubble that flashed into existence around him and her seemed to repel the slug more or less without effort. He called for Garrus to "take out that damned sniper" while he moved her to more secure cover. "Sorry, Liara, for not noticing the sniper, are you alright? Any splash-back?"

"I'm fine, thank you, Shepard, you saved me again…" She blushed for some reason she wasn't certain of, perhaps because this was beginning to seem like the stories read to infants by parents, like the ones her mother used to read her, about brave saviours and/or maidens, some in distress (and some being the saviours, obviously).

"Shepard, the enemies are down, but the barrier isn't, can you come over here and check it out instead of trying to secure mating opportunities?" Wrex rumbled, causing Liara to blush deeper and Shepard to do the same under his helmet.

Another rumble shook the ruins as the barrier finally dropped and the squad ran for the exit of he ruins, up the rapidly disintegrating tunnel. Shepard was lagging behind slightly, so that by the time he entered the Restorer's bottom floor airlock his boot was stepping on glowing rock and his structural fields were beeping thermal warnings. He finally took a breather as the airlock slammed shut and the Restorer boosted off the ground at high speed, docking with the Normandy moments later. Shepard grabbed some ration bars and a water bottle out of his armour compartments and passed them to Liara, who tore into them. "I think I can walk now, Shepard, you can put me down now, thanks." She said, Shepard took off his helmet and looked down at her worriedly.

"You sure? Alright…" he put her down moments before the Restorer docked to the Normandy with a quiet thump.

"Too close, Commander, ten more seconds and you'd have been swimming in molten sulphur (yeah I live in Canada, I hate the spelling too). The Restorer is not equipped to land in exploding volcanoes, they tend to damage the quad light laser's focusing crystals and scorch the paint, just for future reference." Joker's voice said over the intercom as the group proceeded toward the top floor of the Restorer and the interface airlock there, linked with the Normandy.

"We barely escaped and you pilot is making morbid jokes?"

"You'll find that the name 'Joker' is a bit… excessively accurate for him." Shepard kept on walking toward the back of the Restorer.

"Where are we going, isn't this your ship?" Liara said, looking around at the gleaming white walls and lively green shades that dominated the elegant craft.

"Nah, this is a Restorer Gunship, we use it for the Normandy's shuttle." Shepard said as they entered the elevator at the back of the Restorer.

"Well, it's a pretty big shuttle." Liara said. "These walls are almost like something the Asari would make…" she touched one, finding it smooth and glossy, unlike the slightly gritty texture of Garrus' armour or the slightly rough finish of Shepard's armour, more akin to Tali or Wrex's armour.

"I've heard that a lot about Aeon Illuminate designs." Shepard said, turning to regard the blue beauty with soft brown eyes. "The Illuminate has only allowed a few of their planets to be opened to Citadel Races for tourism, but I hear said planets are almost excessively popular among Asari on their honeymoon, because it is like home but still very exotic to them. Some of the planets are also popular for Hanar tourists, though their tentacles do tend to wield too many cameras at once and annoy other races, especially the Seraphim there. So, now that that's over with, what's your main field of research, Dr. T'Soni?" For some odd reason, even without the mission, he had a feeling he would have almost been excessively eager to get to know her better.

"I mainly do research on Protheans, specializing in the later days of the Prothean reign, that is to say, their extinction. I've come up with a new theory, that the Protheans were systematically eradicated by some unknown force, but no scientific journal has accepted it thus far, because I am still very young by the standards of my people."

"Hi Commander, we've self-destructed and reclaimed everything, how's things going on your end?" Ashley's voice came over the intercom.

"Fine, Ash."

"Oh, and Liara, how old are you if you're considered very young?"

"Only a hundred and six Galactic Standard Years."

"That's not that young… especially considering most of the people over two hundred in the Coalition died…" Ashley trailed off. "That's a topic for another day, John, have you told her your theory yet?"

"Oh, yes, Liara, the Protheans were wiped out by a race of sentient machines called the Reapers." Shepard said, looking back at Liara from the video feed of Ashley on the Normandy's CIC, displayed on the wall screen of the elevator, while they walked out of said elevator.

"Reapers? I have never heard of them…" She appeared thoughtful at the new information. "It does seem plausible, considering how few records remain from that period in their history…" They had reached the top floor airlock of the Restorer.

"I received a vision from a Prothean beacon on Eden Prime, it was about the fall of the Protheans, I'm sure of it, but it's still pretty muddled and unclear…" Shepard trailed off as the airlock cycled and they passed into the Normandy via a connecting catwalk, complete with atmospheric containment field, a catwalk which was reclaimed once they entered the ship.

"Perhaps I could be of assistance; I have heard that an objective perspective helps greatly in such a situation. If I melded with you, I may be able to help discern something from the vision…" Liara trailed off, looking around the inside of the Normandy's cargo bay "This is a very large bay, Shepard, and that, is a VERY large tank." Indeed, she was understating by a considerable amount, but she was past caring considering the sheer size of the hulking obsidian war machine.

"That's our Rhino Medium Tank that we have onboard, now, you were saying something about melding? I hope you won't melt my brain or something…" Shepard said, looking into her blue eyes inquisitively.

"Don't worry, I have been tested, and the tests are 99.9999 percent accurate, I'm not going to harm you." Liara was hurt by the accusation "It's very rare, even among purebloods… besides, my mother isn't a pureblood, and those with the condition only do damage in a mating meld… this isn't one."

"What are you talking about? I was just joking… though it is good to know you won't be frying my brain." Shepard gave a disarming smile, even though he felt like his foot was shoved so far up his mouth he could walk out of his ass.

"Oh, sorry, I thought you meant… never mind, please calm and clear your mind… Embrace Eternity!" Her eyes went pitch black before Shepard's mind began to go through the images from the beacon once again, this time slightly slower but still resulting in a chaotic rush and mess that his twined AI tried to sort out but was slowly overwhelmed by.

* * *

While the two were standing there, transfixed, Garrus commented snidely to Wrex "You should have saved the 'mating opportunities' comment for this moment, Wrex." and immediately got cuffed around the head by Tali.

"Ow, what was that for?"

"Shut up, you bosh'tet, it's rude to say that sort of thing about your commanding officer behind his back, at least Wrex said it to his face."

"Why should I shut up? And what should I do if I want to say something about you? It's kinda hard to say things to your face…" Garrus mumbled, rubbing his fringe.

"I have a flamethrower…" Tali said in warning.

* * *

"There was some… other, inside your mind, Shepard, it tried to push me out, and nearly succeeded, until your brain told it to stop, what in the name of the Goddess was it?" Liara said tiredly, having fallen into Shepard's arms in exhaustion after the melding.

"Sorry, Liara, I forgot to turn off the symbiont defence and firewall protocols before we melded, I didn't expect it to be like that…" He said, supporting her weight against his armour while he raised his voice "Hey guys, the mission's over, feel free to do whatever you want, other than something against the rules."

"Shepard, I don't think the 'Don't blow up the ship' article in the rules list was entirely necessary" Wrex deadpanned while passing by.

"You never know, Wrex, you never know…" Shepard was helping Liara along to the med-bay, or rather, one of the elevators.

"True, that."

* * *

"You seem to be fine, just fatigued, hungry, and slightly dehydrated, take it easy for a few days and you'll be fine. I think you should stay here tonight for monitoring though, just in case, alright?" The platinum blonde doctor, Carolyn Chakwas, said. "Call me if you need anything, I'll be in my office reviewing the latest health reports for the crew, by the way, Shepard asked me to not let you have access to a computer until I deem you rested enough. There's some things you need to learn about the Coalition if you're going to join the crew… which you probably want to do considering your mother's involved, and this is likely one of the safest places to be."

"Okay, Doctor Chakwas, thanks for you help, can you dim the lights please? Thanks."

"Don't mention it" was the last thing Liara heard before she fell asleep, still wondering why her mother had apparently joined Saren and betrayed the Council.

* * *

Shepard started the video conference with a brief summary of what happened on Therum "We dropped onto the surface of Therum and engaged Geth forces surrounding the dig site where Dr. T'Soni was most likely working. After all surface Geth forces were eliminated; we advanced into the ruins and retrieved Dr. T'Soni by using a mining laser to get around a Prothean security device that had her trapped inside. The ruins became unstable and we were forced to make a run for the exit, escaping just in time. That concludes my mission summary."

"What we don't understand is why you did not restrain and interrogate Dr. T'Soni considering her mother's connection to Saren." The Turian Councillor said, frowning.

Shepard frowned right back "It's quite simple, I trust Dr. T'Soni after I witnessed the situation. The Geth were there to either retrieve or kill her. If she was in league with Saren, they would not have been trying to kill her, would they? I imagine Saren didn't want someone with her knowledge on our side, would you?"

"A reasonable decision, Commander, though it was too bad the Prothean ruins were destroyed, are you certain there was no other way of getting to Dr. T'Soni?" The Salarian Councillor said, nodding slowly.

"It was either use the mining laser, reclaim the ruins, which would probably be even worse, or wait for the Prothean device to run out of power, I think if we did that Liara would have died of old age inside that bubble, do you agree?" Shepard raised an eyebrow.

"Alright Commander, we trust your judgement, before you ask, there have been no new leads on Saren at the moment." The Asari Councillor finished "Good luck, commander." The three holograms winked out.

"Damn." Shepard muttered to himself, before turning and walking out of the conference room.

* * *

A/N: Longest Chapter so far, over 10,000 words for the first time (in my writings)…

Review and critique (praise is welcome too, of course)!


	14. The Astounded Asari

A/N: kiriakoen, what sort of SupCom ME Crossover would this be if the main character doesn't get to run around in a Command Unit, build bases, and kick serious ass? (In this case, the Normandy has an SCU, in compacted mode, on its hull cargo clamps, sorry, no ACU yet.)

Also, please do not ask too much about pairings, though I guarantee you the pairings will reveal some things humanity never knew about itself.

* * *

Chapter 14: The Astounded Asari

_En Route to Citadel from Therum, 31 May, 3868_

"Hey Wrex" Shepard had just finished the meeting with the Council, and now was back for the after-mission work with Wrex and Garrus that he would have had to do at some point anyways.

"Hey Shepard" The Krogan's one visible, red, eye rotated to look at his face, like the rest of the crew that had heavy or medium armour he'd put his armour in the locker under his bed and worn other clothes, in Wrex's case, that meant his old red armour (Garrus wore his old blue light armour).

"So what do you say to doing your armour upgrades, Wrex? Anything you find insufficient about the baseline performance?" Shepard asked the Krogan, who was looking over a console near the Rhino, which Garrus was tinkering around in, again.

Wrex turned away from the console, looking Shepard in the face with both red gun-barrel eyes and bringing his face right up to Shepard's. He glared at the Commander for a moment before speaking "Shepard, let me be extremely direct with you. That Seraphim Heavy Armour you gave me was the, to quote a particular human Sergeant, think his name was Johnson or something… I'd heard once in passing, 'sickest, most badass piece of divine intervention I've ever worn.' Did you really think I'd think the over-shield, shield and structural field was anything less than excellent? I've been alive for fifteen hundred years, and the only things I've seen tougher than it on a soldier was probably the one time someone unfortunate got crushed under an APC right in front of my face." Wrex broke the glare and cracked a Krogan smile. "That mission was a lot of fun, Shepard, I hope we'll be on another one soon, I want to test out my armour upgrades, after I apply them."

"Alright, come over to the nanolathe, Garrus, you too when you're ready!" Shepard shouted the last part.

"Sure!" There was a dull thud, followed by an "Ow!" before Garrus climbed out of the top hatch of the Rhino and descended the ladder that slotted out from the thick plating of the tank, joining Wrex and Shepard in front of the nanolathe and Wrex alone in staring at the list of upgrades. Behind the trio, the ladder slotted neatly back into the armour, melding with the material like it had never been there.

* * *

The first thing that Liara T'Soni saw when she woke up was a pair of soft brown eyes above her, then a somewhat deep but warm voice said "How are you feeling, Liara?" the world came into focus as she rubbed her eyes, trying to figure where she was and who the eyes belonged to, and why the hell she felt safe just listening to it.

"I'm fine, where am I… oh, right, I'm on the Normandy… This med bay seems really nice, Shepard." She poked the plush pillow with a blue finger.

"It's supposed to be, Liara, the beds can adjust their stiffness to be everything from an operation table to a soft, plush bed, which it's set to right now." Indeed, it was nice, warm, and she felt like she could lay in it forever.

She sat up and asked "I'd like to join you on your hunt for Saren; I want to find out what happened to my mother, what should I do, Shepard?" She swung her legs over the side of the bed and found two comfortable, warm, and fuzzy slippers there, so she put her feet into them.

"Well, I wouldn't mind that you come along; after all, we already have a Quarian Machinist, Krogan Battlemaster, and a Turian C-Sec agent onboard. The first thing is to settle you into your quarters, then give you a tour of the ship, and then choose you a set of armour, we should probably get it done before we return to the Citadel." Shepard told her, helping pull her upright with a strong, warm and gentle hand… _Wait where did that come from?_ She wondered, before she realized something.

"There's a Krogan Battlemaster onboard? I didn't see a Krogan in your ground team, is he violent? What's his name?" She was worried; she had NOT had very many pleasant conversations with Krogan in the past.

"You've already met him, Wrex, you know, the embarrassing comments guy?" Shepard tilted his head at her as they walked out of the med bay, him leading. She noticed she still had her dark green outfit on; she'd probably need a bath…

"That was a Krogan in the armour with the shoulder towers? Well, I guess it sort of makes sense… the face was kind of low in the torso piece and the hump did have space…" Liara was pensive, Wrex had seemed reasonably nice, and unlike the Krogan she had dealt with in her past, but you could never really tell… as she'd found out one too many times with fellow Asari.

"Here are your quarters, Liara, Number 13." Shepard handed her a pass card "go ahead, swipe it." He smiled indulgently at her, his eyes twinkling mischievously.

She did as he said, the door clicked from red to green, and Shepard opened the door for her, she noted the door handle system, rather primitive for such an advanced ship… Then the lights activated, and her eyebrow patches (a skin pattern present on all Asari for unknown reasons) went up, the suite was quite well-furnished, similar to her mother's chambers on her private shuttle, by what she could remember. A large bed dominated the main room, with a desk and a computer console flanking the bed, and a door on her right led to the washroom. "These quarters are quite nice, Shepard, but I have a question, how would you fit the crew needed to operate the ship if everyone gets such spacious quarters?"

"Liara, you are the newest member of the crew, so you got the largest number on your quarters. There's one crew member per suite, you can calculate the number of crew on the ship, and by the way, my quarters are number 00."

"But… that means there are only 14 people on the ship!" Liara was shocked, how large was the ship anyways? The cargo bay seemed to indicate the ship was at least the size of a council Heavy Frigate, around 150 meters long at least, such a ship would require at least seventy to ninety crewmembers if it had been an Asari vessel.

"Coalition starships come standard with an extreme degree of automation, Liara, we don't need that many crew to keep the ship running. There are only ten Coalition members onboard, and we take care of all three duty shifts without any trouble." Shepard explained, gesturing to Liara "I'm guessing you want to take a shower and get a change of clothes, you'll find that in the closet, just shove your clothes in the cleaner system before you take your shower. I have something you should see, and I want to ask you some questions, get to know you better…"

"Okay, Shepard, see you in a bit." Liara smiled, and then entered the bathroom, thinking about the Saren-hunt and what she had seen so far of the ship and its shuttle, or rather, Restorer Gunship. The styles really were quite different. The insides of the ship's halls were made of a black metal with red circuitry, with the occasional area of grey with light blue circuits, or a deep blue with yellow circuits. The insides of the Restorer were almost purely made of matte white walls with bright green circuits, with the occasional area of blue with yellow circuits. Why would the ships be so different? Would it not be more efficient to build their ships out of the same types of material and/or use fewer colours of paint? At least the tank was consistent with the main style of the inside of the ship, black and red dominating its lines.

She noted the closet, separated from the rest of the washroom by a large, translucent (frosted glass) screen door, incidentally, it also had an opaque door on the other side, accessible from the bedroom. She opened it and raised an eyebrow at all her clothes from the dig site, along with her artefacts and personal effects, neatly laid out or hung up inside, she wondered how they'd gotten the stuff onboard… She didn't notice anyone unloading any crates from the Restorer when they'd boarded the Normandy, and the dig site had already been consumed by lava flow, so they could not have gone down for a second run to pick up her stuff. She shrugged to herself, closed the screen door, and began to peel the outfit she'd worn for the last several days off.

She dumped it in the alcove marked "Dirty clothes here" before she turned and realized she didn't know how exactly the shower worked. The Asari showers all had two knobs, one for hot water and one for cold, this one had a single lever-like thing. She looked closer, under the handle there was a circle with the left half red and the right half blue, like the red and blue circles on standard Asari taps. She picked up the showerhead… at least that was the same as the standard Asari style, more or less, then pointed it away from herself, and turned the tap on, to the right at first. Cold water was what met her finger, testing the flow. She turned it toward the left, and the water grew warmer, until she found it a comfortable temperature, then she began to rinse herself while looking around for cleaning products.

She hummed to herself as she lathered herself with soap, noting the dull white walls of the bathroom and the round mirror and sink, of the same style as the inside of the Restorer had been, truly an interesting vessel... She washed away the grime and sweat of the last few days with a soft sigh, revelling in the feeling of the warm water running over her blue skin…

* * *

Shepard was checking over the documents he'd uploaded to Liara's console when he heard the bathroom door open again. "Shepard, I'm done, what did you want to talk about?" she said in her angelic voice.

"It's just a few things, nothing really to do with the mission, I wanted to ask you, how much do you know about the Coalition of Species?" He couldn't help the smile that crept onto his face as he watched her dry her head crests with a towel

"Not much, besides the fact that the Turians discovered you guys two years ago, the Coalition having three species, Human, Seraphim and Drell, holding a total of 15% of the Galactic Plane, and being technologically advanced. I haven't been paying much attention to the news, considering how I'm out on long-term digs a lot."

"Well, the Citadel news got those parts right, but do you know some of the more specific details of the Turian War, or as the Council call it the Relay 282 Incident?"

"I heard the conflict started when a Turian patrol fleet responding to sightings of unidentified alien ships ran into a group of Coalition ships tampering with a Primary Mass Relay, which was against Citadel conventions. The admiral in command on the Turian side decided to open fire, and so the war started. In the end, the Council had to step in and mediate peace negotiations, and the Turian Hierarchy was forced to pay heavy reparations." She said in her innocent-sounding voice.

"That's all they told you? That figures…" Shepard frowned.

"Why, is something wrong, Shepard?" Liara now sounded slightly worried "Did I say something wrong?"

"Have you been to Palaven since that War, or any of the hundred Turian colonies closest to Coalition Space?"

"The Turian Homeworld? No, I haven't been there so far, or to any of the Turian colonies for over twenty years. Why would you ask that?"

"Hmm, well that's understandable, I guess, so then you wouldn't have noticed the changes… Liara, there are some things you should know about the Turian War, but before I tell you about that, I need to show you some of humanity's history. It won't be pretty, and some of it makes me sick, but you deserve the full truth, directly from a human, not just the documentary stuff."

Liara felt a sudden sense of foreboding "What happened during the Turian War?"

"You should watch the documentary about the Infinite War first, then the Seraphim War and formation of the Coalition of Species, then you will have a better understanding of how the Turian War went, and some of the things and cultural references you will see onboard this ship. This movie was made for those new to the Coalition, so that they could understand some of the Coalition's taboos…" Shepard clicked play and stood up from the console's seat as the holoprojector above the console began to project an image. "Would you like to watch on your own or may I accompany you?"

"I wouldn't mind if you watched it with me," Liara said, sitting on the seat at the desk, Shepard walked around the bed and stood beside her as the history summary started, not noticing her blush at the proximity. She had no clue why she felt so… comfortable near this human, that that bothered her, until her attention was drawn to the large section of, well, wall space, that served as the backdrop for the hologram, that formed a 2D screen in midair for more comfortable viewing in the relatively small space of a bedroom.

The narrator began to speak "Space held such high hopes for humanity, a new start, a chance to let old grievances wither and die." A large, boxy-looking starship moved across the camera's view, tracked by the camera, toward an octagonal object which blazed with energy, its eight red lights blinking green as the ship approached and entered. "Quantum Gate Networks allowed humanity to push deeper and deeper into space" a quantum transport tunnel, from the first generation of quantum travel devices, lit up the screen, before the viewpoint looked at the rear of the ship from before, over a brown desert planet.

Here, Shepard paused the video and centered the view on the planet for a moment. "This is Procyon, the first of the core worlds of the Cybran Nation. It was terraformed starting in 2600, the project succeeded in 2601, one Earth Year, essentially a Standard Galactic Year later." He resumed the video

"Countless worlds were colonized, governed by the Earth Empire, humanity entered a golden age of peace and prosperity." The video now showed a golden city of spires on the shores of a great bay, shining in the golden light of the dawn, air cars and flying ships moving across the skyline, ground transit snaking between the towers.

Liara paused the playback to comment "That city reminds of Ilium, the one time I visited the planet."

"The pace quickened, a human brain was successfully combined for the first time with an artificial intelligence for the first time by Doctor Gustaf Brackman, the Symbionts were born." It showed a middle-aged scientist working at a red-lighted console with a rotating schematic of a human brain with implants. The scene faded and shifted to a shaky view of the same city as before, burning and crumbling, pillars of smoke reaching into the sky "Eventually, humanity's more base instincts took hold, and the thread began to unravel." The scene shifted to a number of humans, bald and with facial circuitry, seated at rows of blue-coloured holographic consoles. "The symbionts demanded independence. The Earth Empire's response was a secret Loyalty Program that enslaved anyone with an AI implant." A black, beetle-like ship lifted off into the sky, banking in the red light of the setting sun. "Dr. Brackman fled with his closest Symbionts and formed the Cybran Nation. They would fight for their freedom!" The same beetle-like ship flew past, tracked by the camera and followed by a number of escorts, fighters.

The scene faded to black, and a green, lush world faded into view "On the planet known as Seraphim II, an alien race called the Seraphim was discovered. The Seraphim taught the settlers something called… The Way" a glittering city came into view on the shore of a great sea, with several islands in the foreground. "But despite these peaceful overtures the Seraphim were attacked by xenophobic soldiers." The city vanished in a bright whit flash, and a withered, gaunt alien hand held in the hand of a human faded in. "Soon, the Seraphim were no more, the Aeon Illuminate vowed to spread the Way and cleanse the Galaxy of non-believers" the woman looked up at the horizon from the Seraphim's corpse. Another lush world came into view "The Earth Empire collapsed" the first flash appeared on its surface, followed by another, and another, and even more "the galaxy fell into Darkness and Chaos" the pattern of strategic nuclear detonations spilled over to the night side of the world.

Suddenly, the scene cut out and a screen of an UEF Experimental Transport (one of the original experimentals, they stopped fielding them because the two-tiered design wasn't convenient for ferrying high tier units that came along later) rising from behind a hill "Out of the ashes rose the United Earth Federation, an old idea made new. Unite the Galaxy and restore peace and order, no matter the cost." It began offloading the dozens of tanks it carried. The screen then shifted again "The invention of the Armoured Command Unit made killing efficient" a gigantic, bulky armoured humanoid, towering over the tanks that rolled by near it, pivoted to its left and fired three pulses into the sky at a pair of passing fighters, which were dog-fighting. The second one was hit and began to go down, trailing fire and smoke "armies could be constructed anywhere at a moment's notice."

The quantum tunnel went back, showing Seraphim II slowly spinning again "the Infinite War, between the Cybran Nation, Aeon Illuminate, and Earth Empire, later superseded by the UEF," the three logos showed in order, "would rage on for twelve hundred years. Trillions of lives were lost." The quantum tunnel backtracked to Procyon "But now the actors were assembled, the final act was about to begin, it was time for the Infinite War… to end." The tunnel backtracked to Earth, where the orbital Quantum Gate and the islands of the Hawaii chain were clearly shown. The scene cut out, and showed the large silver letters of "End of the Infinite War."

Liara paused the video almost absent-mindedly "Shepard, that's… incredible, more than an Asari's lifetime of constant warfare, yet your race is still flourishing, unlike the Krogan, who nuked themselves back to a technological dark age and ruined their Homeworld…"

"Oh, we did indirectly ruin our Homeworld. That would be part of what brought the Infinite War to an end. Do you want to stop watching?"

"No, I need to learn, I need to understand, if I am to work with your crew effectively."

* * *

Liara felt sick, how could the humans work with the Seraphim, after they killed nearly a trillion humans? Granted, it was a case of the enemy of one's enemy, but still… "How… how could you have worked with them?" John looked at her quizzically. "The Seraphim, I mean."

"Well, the Separatists turned the tide at one of the pivotal battles of the Seraphim War, Operation Black Day. They also helped rebuild the planets the Loyalists razed, but above all, the Separatists were a different faction from the Loyalists, who had killed fewer humans than any of the UEF, Aeon or Cybrans had anyways. If you'd lost trillions upon trillions of civilians over the course of a thousand-some year war, society becomes… numb. The new generation that was too young to remember the Seraphim War, part of the baby boom after the Infinite War was the main reason we reacted so badly to the Turians using asteroid warfare."

"Wait, baby boom? Didn't The Seraphim War start less than a day after the Infinite War ended?" Liara was frowning in curiosity.

"It's amazing how many conceptions can occur in a few hours of partying, before all the humans in the galaxy realize another war of genocide is upon them." John rolled his eyes, holding Liara gently by the shoulders as she was still hanging onto his left arm, shivering once in a while as the horrifying footage of the Seraphim War danced across the screen. "Now, let's fast forward to the Turian War, shall we?"

Liara finally realized she was hugging John's arm like it was a lifeline, she blushed a deep purple and let go immediately "That would be nice…"

* * *

"Liara? Liara! Are you alright? Talk to me!" Shepard was worried, Liara was gaping at the screen while four hundred planets of the Turian Hierarchy fell group by group to the Coalition, within less than 24 hours 40% of the Hierarchy's territory had been purged of military installations, mostly by reclamation, and Palaven had been conquered. She finally shook her head to clear it and looked up at him.

"This was when the Council intervened to negotiate a peace, wasn't it?"

"Yes, and the treaty included stationing Coalition military outposts on 100 of the nearest Turian planets to Coalition Space, and the placement of an orbital battle station over Palaven."

"I imagine the Turians were not too happy about that last part, or the other part." Liara said, as the video proceeded to show footage of the orbital battle station, which only showed itself occasionally (dropped cloak) as a warning of its presence. The station's size, a two kilometre long cuboid shape, suggested extreme danger, and the immense power generation required to maintain cloak was an even greater showcase of the Coalition's might. "Is there something that can explain to me how your armies conquered Turian territory so quickly?"

"Well, there's the video for the military units of the four factions…"

* * *

"By now, I'm almost surprised your Coalition's armies did not flatten the Turian Hierarchy faster." Liara commented after a long, comfortable silence, the videos having ended and the room being bathed in light again, she got up from her seat and smiled at Shepard, who was still standing behind and to the side of the chair. "Thank you, Shepard, for talking with me during the videos, it helped my understanding a lot, though it never told me how the armies were deployed, only how they perform in battle."

"Information about the deployment and tactic s of the Coalition armies are not to be revealed to members of any of the non-Coalition Races unless it is deemed mission-critical. Considering my position, I am allowed to release such information to you when it becomes mission-critical, but not before. The same is true of Tali, Garrus, and Wrex, Garrus has no idea how the Coalition moved so fast during the war, and the Turians, even their special forces, believe the assault to be based on stealthed warships dropping off the armies, I can neither support nor dismiss that claim until it becomes mission-critical, but I can assure you, Liara, and when it is time, you will be first to know. I'm sorry, but that is how it must be… for the good of the whole Galaxy." Shepard shrugged helplessly, his eyes showing nothing but truth, the whole truth, to Liara's gaze. "Even Garrus, in the Command Simulators, was only allowed to access the Command Bunker scenarios and settings."

"I see. Is there anything I could do aboard the ship? A station I can be of use in?" Liara began to feel nervous again, it seemed that with such a small crew needed onboard, she would be useless, extraneous. She hated the feeling of being useless…

"The console in these quarters will be able to access all the information you had from your digs and past records that we scanned. The cargo bay nanolathe is at your disposal at any time, it could most likely allow you to eventually create something to read those Prothean disks, such as this one Ashley and Kaidan found in a minor ruin." He held it up "Ashley only dropped it once."

"DROPPED IT?" Liara was gaping at Sheppard, who was idly twirling the Prothean data disk around his index finger "Shepard, could I please have that? It's a priceless artefact… can you not twirl it like that? It's scaring me…" she said, her eyes wide and staring at the disk.

For some reason even John Shepard himself wasn't entirely sure of, he immediately stopped and handed the disk over with the expression of a child with his hand caught in the cookie jar. _You idiot, of course you're sure why you did that! You're interested in her, duh…_ He could hear his brain rolling its figurative eyes at him from inside his head. Sheppard didn't like it. "Sorry, Liara, I hope this disk can help with your research."

"It's okay, Shepard, at least the disc wasn't broken down…" Liara said, cradling the artefact carefully in her slender hands.

"Uh… in the process of Reclamation and/or Quantum Transport, matter is instantaneously broken down and reassembled elsewhere without damage, so in a way… that disc was broken down." She gave him a sad, hurt and angry look that made him want to give her a big hug, tell her everything would be fine, and hold her, while also making him feel completely worthless "We have its compositional scan readings and interior structure mapped out and uploaded onto your computer, that includes all potential EM and storage mediums inside, it should help you greatly."

Her raised-eyebrows look had morphed into a big smile before she wrapped him in a bear hug. "Thank you, Shepard! No one has ever successfully scanned and accessed the interior of a Prothean Data Disc before…" She said, he head against his chest, hearing the soft humping of his heart, and for some reason blushing all over.

Sheppard was blushing too, she saw once she let go "Liara, before you get too caught up in work, I want to get you a set of Coalition Marine armour."

"Like the armours your team was wearing?" Liara looked intrigued "I had wanted to ask about those armours, I thought the Coalition had a company known as Kassa Fabrication, which supplied high-quality armours to the rest of the galaxy, the Colossus line…" she trailed off, waiting for an answer.

"That's a Drell-owned corporation that incorporates Mass Effect technologies with the power of mass fabrication for raw materials. It's one of the highlights of the United Nations of Drell and is one of the major exporters from Coalition space, helps balance out the imports of goods from Coalition Space, especially Asari goods, in demand in the Aeon Illuminate for their aesthetic appeal."

"Then what do the Coalition Marines use, what were you using when you rescued me?" Liara asked, curiosity making her push for answers.

"We use four main lines of armours, the Aeon, UEF, Cybran and Seraphim. Wrex used a Seraphim Heavy, Garrus a UEF Heavy, I use a Cybran Heavy, Tali uses an Aeon Light, Ashley, who you haven't met yet, uses Aeon Heavy, and Kaidan uses Aeon Medium. I would recommend a Light or Medium for you, and probably Aeon, considering your main focus is biotics, unlike me, I'm weapons-oriented so I use Cybran, like a lot of Soldier class Marines."

"Can you give me a run-through of the armours?" Liara asked, Shepard brought up the hologram of the twelve armours, complete with captions and floating text boxes, all of which she could enlarge by touching and dragging the holograms. She began to read, standing next to her bed; while Shepard began reviewing reports on his wrist computer (Liara would call it an omni-tool).

After a few minutes, Sheppard thought to ask her for an ETD (Estimated Time to Decision), he really had to go back to check on crew status now, and ideally get breakfast, Liara hadn't eaten either since the MREs the previous Ship Night, so he felt the need to remind her "Liara, we need to go eat breakfast, you're still recovering, and we've put it off for long enough. Besides, you'll probably take a while to choose between these twelve armour models, upward of an hour, most likely, you need to keep your strength up, let's go to the mess hall to get something to eat"

"You're right, Shepard, I do suddenly feel hungry again…" Liara said, finally tearing her eyes away from the hovering display of the twelve armour types and turning the display off before following Shepard out of her room. The meal passed in amicable silence for the two of them as they ate together, until they started to exchange small talk. Finally, when the meal ended, Shepard took his leave, he needed to make his rounds as Commander of the Normandy, after all, Liara said goodbyes, and then went back to her quarters to review her armour choices.

* * *

"Hey Ash, what do you think of our newest guest?" John Shepard settled into the bridge station next to his childhood friend, who was effectively babysitting Joker and making sure his earphones worked i.e. loud, obnoxious moaning noises did not fill the bridge, as occasionally happened much to the consternation of Navigator Pressly.

"She seems alright as a person, but we both know appearances can be deceiving" indeed, they had both seemed perfectly sweet and innocent children, when in reality they were devious pranksters, along with John's twin, James. "I just hope she's not like her mother, and that she doesn't try to abuse the freedom you gave her."

"I trust my judgement of her as a person, she won't do anything to harm us, she just wants to find out what happened to her mom…" John trailed off, thinking of the young Asari and looking blankly into space.

THUD!

"Ow, what was that for?" John put a hand to the back of his head gingerly.

"It is very rude to fantasize about someone you just recruited, John, or did you forget that Liara's only been onboard for less than a day?" Ashley suddenly frowned "Your little crush is developing pretty fast, John, just make sure don't scare her away, you heard her, among her people, she is little more than a child." Shepard had no reply to that, and so wandered over to the other side of the bridge to talk to Joker.

"So, Captain, I hear you have a thing for a certain resident Asari Scientist…" Joker grinned widely, mischievously.

Shepard facepalmed, groaning "aren't you usually listening to stuff you really shouldn't be listening to through those earphones? Besides, it's Commander Shepard, not Captain Shepard."

"Are you saying that your discussion with Ashley, or rather, her one-way teasing of you which you did not deny, was not something I shouldn't have heard?" Joker grinned "Well, then I did hear what I was supposed to hear! Why are you complaining about me teasing you?"

* * *

Liara had contemplated her armour choices for a long time before finally settling on a choice, setting out to look for Shepard. She had been surprised when she'd voiced her question out loud in the halls of the Normandy "Where is Shepard?" the ship had directed her to the cargo bay.

Shepard had been going over a console when he saw her walk in, after a few words she began to talk about her choice "So I guess Aeon Medium it is for me, like Garrus and Wrex, I want to do the upgrades after a combat mission… to gauge what upgrades I'd want and/or need, would that be okay with you?"

"That's a sound decision, Liara, alright; let's get you your armour." Shepard began walking toward the front of the cargo bay, Liara in tow.

"Where's Wrex and Garrus? I heard the crew talk about how they liked to hang around in here…" Liara looked around over her shoulder toward the massive looming bulk of the Rhino Medium Tank and its three long particle cannon barrels.

"They're most likely either getting some food or catching a nap before we reach the Citadel, they weren't sleeping when you were, and even I caught a nap after helping them get their armour upgrades." Shepard said, stopping in front of a innocuous- looking alcove in the wall that was flanked by two prongs facing inward. He typed in some thing on his wrist computer and the… thing… came to life, the two prongs energizing and gently glowing purplish-white streams appearing between them, connecting the prongs and a rapidly coalescing framework that became fully solid and was moved forward on the pedestal within ten seconds. "Welcome to the wonders of nanolathing." Shepard turned at her and grinned like a maniac.

Liara's mouth was hanging open cutely, in Shepard's professional—no, make that his male opinion, "But… but… how?" was the first thing she managed to get out after she blinked a number of times in pure shock.

"Liara, nanolathing is how we deploy our armies in the field. This nanolathe is a light model, the heavier-duty industrial and military models deployed in the Coalition military can do things a whole lot faster." He explained to her. "They use quantum fields to reformat matter and move it around to fill in gaps after the initial framework is lathed into place. A T2 Land Factory can build a Rhino Medium Tank in twenty-two seconds; it takes a T3 Land Factory just over 14 seconds. A Fatboy Experimental Mobile Factory can do it in a third that time."

Liara's mouth opened again, but no sound came out, she opened and closed it several times, facing Shepard, before her eyes rolled upward and she pitched forward into Shepard's arms. "Liara, wake up!" Shepard was worried, and more than a little irritated at himself for his first thought when she'd fallen into his arms, which was _She feels really soft and warm considering the hard work of archaeology_ instead of the concern it should have been.

Her eyes opened again after a moment "Shepard, I think I just had a really weird dream… wait, why are you holding me up?" She blushed and drew away from him, then looked over at her new armour and put a hand to her mouth. "It wasn't a dream… okay, now it makes sense how fast the Turian Hierarchy was flattened…" she said listlessly, almost to herself, as she stared at the armour.

John sensed her concern and fear, and he spoke up "Liara, the Coalition never had any delusions of grandeur or need for galactic domination, we also don't want to completely throw the rest of the galaxy into chaos, that is why we closed most of our borders and on the open tourist worlds we have everything shipped in via quantum gate from resource areas as opposed to nanolathed on the spot. It's to protect the Citadel races from the shattering impact and long-term war of genocide this sort of technology would bring. Humanity had the Infinite War, the Seraphim had the Separatist Movement, the Drell had almost doomed their homeworld with their Industrial Revolution, all of us knew the price of progress, so the Coalition as a whole decided not to release ANY quantum technology schematics to the galaxy at large. I can authorize you to use a certain set of armour or a given weapon for the rest of your life, but should anyone else not authorized possess it for more than about two days the weapons and armour will self-destruct to protect the Coalition's secrets." He put a hand on her shoulder as she gazed upon the gleaming plates of the Aeon Medium Coalition Marine Armour. "Go on, Liara, test the armour, it'll save your life someday on this mission, I can feel it, you need to learn to use it and all its abilities. I'll help you, Kaidan will help you, he uses the same type of armour, and you can go to Ash and Tali if you want to compare against the Heavy and Light models. Go on, try it out."

"It's not that I don't want to, Shepard," She said slowly, her eyes darting about the armour, before turning her head and looking him in the eyes "I just need to know this… how do you put it on?"

Shepard, if reality had allowed for it, would have probably anime-face-planted at this, but thankfully, Reality did not allow for it. "First, you put on the leg pieces…" He said, guiding her through the process.

* * *

"This armour is really pretty nice, Shepard, even though it's not as good at flexibility as the Asari armours I've used in the past." Liara said, running her hands over the smooth plates of her armour, feeling the texture and smooth ridges of the shoulder pauldrons beneath her fingers.

"The Light armours are for flexibility, speed and agility, the Heavies are for durability, the Mediums are balanced, at least by Coalition standards." Shepard said, watching her move her slender blue hands over her armour with almost perverse interest.

"How strong is this armour?" Liara looked up at Shepard, who was watching her intently.

John snapped out of his stupor and responded "It can lift about 500 kg without strain, it can withstand weights of up to about 20 tons, its over-shield and shields can absorb two Turian Landcruiser shells or a Geth Armature siege pulse without completely failing, and the armour itself can sustain quite a lot of damage too. If you have full shields, over-shields and armour integrity, even without upgrades, a glancing blow from a Geth Colossus would not kill you in one shot. If you have upgrades for everything, a direct hit from a Colossus siege pulse would still not kill you, as long as you have enough energy reserves to dump into the shield attenuator upgrades."

Liara blinked owlishly at him "…Wow." Was all she said as she flexed her armoured arm and scuffed her boot on the ground.

"Well, Liara, let's go to the Weapons Range to get you used to the armour and choose some weapons for you." There was a rack of Coalition infantry weapons in the Range, for crewmen to use while their own weapons were being cleaned or for testing out a weapon before changing one's inventory. John walked into the elevator at the back of the cargo bay, Liara following, and he hit the deck for the Weapons Range, deck 4 (The bottom 3 were for the cargo bay, mass fabricators, quantum core and 2 shield emitters).

Liara was observing him casually when she suddenly started talking, surprising even herself with the words that tumbled out of her mouth. "You fascinate me, Shepard." She blushed at the way that came out

Shepard's heart seemed to stop for a moment, then floor it, when he heard her words; he slowly turned to look at her, smiling warmly, eye twinkling "I never knew you thought of me that way, Liara."

"No, not that, you've seen things Protheans have, been touched by their legacy…"

Shepard's heart fell back to its normal pace, more or less. "It sounds as though you want to dissect me in a lab, Dr. T'Soni…" he grinned as he said this.

"No, no, it's just that you would make a very interesting subject for an in-depth study… Goddess no, that sounds even worse." She covered her eyes with an armoured hand "Shepard, can we pretend this conversation never happened?"

"It's alright, Liara, we all say awkward things sometimes." Shepard patted her on her left shoulder pauldron, a disarming but slightly disappointed smile on his face, which Liara did not detect, considering she was looking down at her feet in embarrassment. The elevator door opened with a ding, and the two walked out into the 100-meter long room that constituted the Weapons Range of the Normandy. On the two sides of the elevator were controls and two racks of weapons, one rack, the heavy weapons and assault weapons, taking up an entire side while the lighter guns took up the other side, sharing their space with a computer console. "Here we are, Liara, you can test your weapons skills with solid-light holograms, almost like the Combat Drones I've seen some Citadel Races employ, or simply choose your weapons. Go ahead, look at the weapons and test their weight. I need to go pick up my armour, I'll be back in a moment." Shepard went back into the elevator, leaving Liara alone in the room before the racks of implements of destruction.

She looked over their names and hefted them. In the end, she decided that since she would be specializing in biotics, the heavy weapons and assault weapons would not suit her so well. However, she still decided that the Ultra-Light Phasic Autogun (ULPA) would be her heavy weapon, as it was the lightest heavy weapon by far and there was no sense wasting the heavy weapons slot on her armour, even if she carried it around to lend to a squad mate in a firefight. She decided on the Phasic Submachine Gun (PSMG) as her main weapon, considering it was more akin to a carbine in its concentrated firepower and decent accurate range. She chose to use a Laser Submachine Gun as her sidearm for its firing rate, power, precision, round velocity, and high cyclic rate.

She debated with herself whether or not to take a pistol, settling for the Laser Pistol for its negligible recoil and light, compact structure. The Phasic Pistol was more akin to hand cannon with its absurdly low firing rate and the Gauss pistol, despite superior firing rate and untraceable rounds, had kick to it.

"Good choices, I see, considering you're specializing in biotics and with Aeon armour upgrades will have a hard time using the special attributes of the assault or other heavy weapons." Shepard's voice said behind her, she turned around to face him after having made her selection at the console. He didn't have his helmet on, it being tucked under his left arm, "Well, Liara, you should test the weapons first before finalizing your choices."

"Okay" she said, picking up the three pistol choices, and bringing them to the range's firing area, placing them on the long table that stretched across the room there, one next to another. "How do I activate—oh." She had picked up the Gauss pistol and it came to life, locking into position and lighting up, preparing to fire its first slugs.

"Coalition infantry weapons run off the armour's reactor core, now that its' ready, go ahead and try it out." A number of targets popped up. Liara got clean critical hits on all of them before she switched out for the laser pistol, doing the same thing in a much shorter time considering the absence of recoil and only a slightly lower cyclic rate. The Phasic Pistol proved difficult, as the rounds, though high-powered, had a low rate of fire. Now the holographic targets damage rates were computed and Liara decided the Laser Pistol was the right choice for her after all.

"Shepard, I stick to my choice of the Laser Pistol." Shepard nodded, and took out his own laser pistol.

"I agree with your choice, after all, I chose the same thing. Now onto the SMGs…" Liara returned the pistols and grabbed the three SMGs, noting their unique design principles. The Phasic SMG used two curved pieces above and below the handle, joined by the handle and a solid area slightly in front of the handle (think Halo Plasma Rifle with the handle a bit closer to the front and the two pieces being big toward the middle, not the front). The Laser and Gauss SMGs shared a two-barrelled design, setting the center of gravity solidly on the handle, being built to be wielded by one hand.

She took aim with the Phasic SMG and began to fire downrange, the rounds flying downrange and smashing into the targets, she nodded approvingly, this would serve her well as a main weapon, the LBR and GLMG seemed a bit large and unwieldy for her to use. This thing was essentially an assault rifle anyways, so she might as well use it as one. The Gauss SMG came next, it had a higher cyclic rate, and fired both barrels simultaneously (to balance the recoil so there was no net force up or down), and it did good damage, but she already had an assault rifle-like weapon, she needed a true SMG, not this carbine-like gun.

The Laser SMG fulfilled her needs perfectly, with its barrels firing alternately; five bursts per second each, a total of ten bursts per second, with lower armour penetration than the Gauss but higher power against flesh and unarmoured targets. This was a true SMG; it would fit perfectly between the PSMG and her Laser Pistol. "Shepard, I'll choose the Phasic for my main weapon and the Laser for my SMG. I think I'll use the ULPA for my heavy weapon; it's the lightest one other than the Shield Disruptor, and I can't handle that much weight and maintain ease of use in biotics, since biotics require movement…"

"Good choice, I recommend you get used to the weapons before you select the 'lathe' option on that console. Then you can go down to the cargo bay and pick your new weapons up. I need to go check on the rest of the crew, and prepare the inventory for transport and sales, have fun, Liara." Shepard nodded to her before moving toward one of the two stairwells at the back of the room, next to the walls.

"Shepard, why do you have an inventory to sell?" Liara was puzzled, what could they possibly need that that fabulous machine, the nanolathe, could not make for them?

"When our armour reclaims something, it is normally placed into the storage rooms on the ship, if we decide to dispose of the stuff, we break it down and put the mass in the Osmium Mass Storages. On the other hand, if we decide to keep it, we can sell it legally in Citadel Space to fetch credits for exotic goods, especially foods, which cannot be nanolathed effectively. That's why I have an inventory to check, look over, and prepare for sale when we get to the Citadel. See you when we get there, Liara."

"Thanks for answering my questions, see you later, Shepard" She went back to weapons practice, it might take her a while to really grow proficient, but she would not let Shepard down…

"See you soon, Liara."

* * *

A/N: I have a question: Considering Benezia's assets, wouldn't Liara have inherited a larger cup size than her profile shot on the Wiki suggests? Expect Liara's assets to be slightly larger than in-game, but not enough to get in the way of flexibility and manoeuvrability in any way.

This was mainly to show Shepard's initial interactions with Liara and to add some more technical details about the Normandy and Coalition infantry weapons.

Expect Shepard and crew to be bored out of their minds running around the citadel doing errands (side quests) while waiting for the next lead on Saren.

REVIEWS WELCOME!


	15. Citadel Errands

A/N: Despite the chapter title, this chapter will reveal some additional facts about the Coalition and help tie to Supreme Commander and Mass Effect universes together in a plausible way, so please do not doze off halfway through.

If you don't like the more boring (Citadel) side quests, please skip this chapter and read the next one when it comes up, thank you. (though Wrex and Garrus are up to their usual funny-ass shit). Note that any non-canon behaviour (Rear Admiral Mikhailovich) may or may not tie in to past/future events.

* * *

Chapter 15: Citadel Errands aka Utter Boredom

_Citadel, 1 June, 3868_

"Shepard, this is Samesh Bhatia, Samesh, Commander Shepard" Ashley nodded between the two men as they shook hands. "Shepard, Mr. Bhatia has a request for you; I think you should hear it"

"Okay, Ash, what would you ask of me?" Shepard regarded the man, looking at his saddened face and deducing immediately that this was either a man to help or a man to get rid of.

"They aren't letting my wife come home; they say that she's in some joint study project between the Coalition and Council to the effects of Geth weapons."

"I served with Nirali in the marine garrison on Eden Prime, Shepard; apparently, she took some severe damage to her armour and body. She's had to have most of her lower body and parts of her neck and arms replaced with bio-synthetic fusion technology, since she's one of the few that reject rapid cloning; it would have taken months to clone a new lower body. The only reason she survived was the onboard stasis program she had for a chest armour upgrade… They're keeping her for studying instead of letting her go home…"

"Wait, if she's more or less okay physically now, why can't she stay with the scientists for a while?" His eyebrows went up as he tilted his head, facing Mr. Bhatia.

Mr. Bhatia showed Shepard his passport "I'm UEF, but my wife… she's Aeon, so… yeah."

Shepard froze up, the Aeon Illuminate's people, though better than before, were still notoriously touchy about prosthetics and bio-synthetic fusions. They saw it as against their basic values and ways, hence their creation of rapid cloning and slow cloning (for those who rejected rapid cloning products) techniques. For an Aeon woman to wake up and discover half her body had been replaced with synthetic flesh and circuits would be an extremely traumatising experience, especially since they tended to be shunned in Aeon society, though with Princess Rhianne in power this had slowly grown less significant over the years.

That was not to mention the fact that many people still disapproved of inter-faction marriages… "I understand now, rest assured that I will do everything possible to make them send your wife home while she's acclimatizing to her new… accessories."

"Thank you, Commander Shepard; I will forever be in your debt." The dark-skinned man bowed in respect.

"Don't mention it, it's part of my job to help those who cannot help themselves." Shepard knew how it would take even a Cybran a number of hours to achieve perfect control over an artificial larynx, so he wasn't surprised the Aeon woman could not yet manage to make the research teams let her go…

Shepard, followed by all the members of his ground teams, all in their Coalition armour, marched into the Embassies Lounge area, seeing the human embassy's chief clerk leaning against a wall of the right, Shepard marched up to him and extended his hand "I'm Commander Shepard, Spectre, you are aware of Nirali Bhatia's case?"

"I'm in charge of it, yes." Bosker watched the armoured marine, flanked by six fully armoured soldiers, carefully; he looked like he would not hesitate to kill him if he did not tell the truth…

"Why has Nirali Bhatia not been released to go home to her husband?" Shepard said curtly, releasing the man's hand and glaring at the man.

"You see, the wounds on her body and armour are inconsistent with the results of previously known Geth Weaponry the Council has informed us about, so we are now in a joint exercise with the Council going over bodies and survivors found on Eden Prime, she's unique in having sustained the most damage out of the survivors. We may have to monitor her recovery progress over the next few years to see if the new Geth pulse weapons have long-term effects" The man rambled on, until he noticed the marine's eyes narrowed in irritation.

"The very values of the Coalition are being shaken if you are holding the survivors, the witnesses of the awful destruction at Eden Prime, against their will, Mr. Bosker" Shepard had read the man's nametag before resuming his glare "You can get your long-term results by having her local hospital transmit scan data whenever she has a checkup of her implants, and you can get weapons data by looking at her armour, or what's left of it. Why do you have to keep a distraught survivor who can't even talk back at you in your goddamned research program when you can study the dead ones?"

"You don't understand, we need to closely observe the long-term effects and to see if the bio-synthetic fusion that has been installed is affected in any way." The man found himself lifted off the ground and slammed against the wall by the angry marine.

"Did you hear yourself, Bio-Synthetic Fusion; did you hear what you just said?" Shepard hissed at the man, his voice cold. "Do you know what faction she's from?"

"Her husband's UEF… is she UEF? Is that why she's been so upset during this program?" UEF people didn't like bio-synthetic fusion much either, they tended to prefer either cloned or prosthetic stuff. Only the Cybrans accepted well, pretty much anything, as long as it did not have adverse effects on the user.

"Let me give you a hint, fucktard, she's a follower of the Way." The clerk went white immediately "I think you should let her go back to those who can actually help her, and instead study her armour, whatever parts of her you removed, and the remains of the dead, shouldn't you?" He dropped the man unceremoniously.

"Yes, immediately, Commander" It was only then that Shepard noted the insignia next to the name on the name-tag, apparently, this man was from the Aeon Illuminate, no wonder he'd understood so quickly once Shepard had revealed Nirali's Aeon factionality.

"I trust that Nirali will be allowed to go home to her husband immediately and receive full medical support from this point onward, as stipulated in the marine enlistment policies?" The clerk was rapidly typing into his omni-tool.

Bosker looked up and nodded rapidly "Yes, of course, I swear upon the Way that I will ensure Nirali Bhatia is returned to her family" before going back to his omni-tool.

"Good, come on, guys, we have things to do and places to be." Shepard and the ground team trooped out of the embassy lounge casually, stopping by Mr. Bhatia to inform him of the results of their discussion and to inform him that he should go ask Clerk Bosker about where he should pick Nirali up.

"Why did you threaten him, Shepard?" Ashley asked the question Liara had been thinking of.

"The man was obviously unwilling to release Nirali to her husband's care unless I made it very clear he had to do it right away, his being Aeon himself was an unexpected but added perk, it simply helped smooth the ride." Shepard said seriously, before rolling his eyes "does anyone else think that was almost like a side quest in one of those role-playing games?"

The squad, other than Liara, collectively facepalmed "Shepard, please stop stating the obvious." Garrus said in his flanging voice before the group trooped into the transit vehicle, on their way to the bar Flux for some drinks that were not pure ethanol doped with water, which was the only thing similar to a drink the Normandy's nanolathe could provide.

* * *

"Thank you, Spectre, for this OSD." The Asian woman said earnestly, bowing in respect.

"It's not a problem, Ms. Wong; after all, we can't let C-Sec completely hush everything up, can we?" Shepard grinned at the Asian woman, only Liara and Tali standing beside him because the others had either chosen to go to Flux for R&R or, in Ashley's case, "to baby-sit all these big lugs and make sure they don't get into too much trouble". "Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"Well… my boss also gave me a secondary assignment… to do a story on the overworked traffic controllers at the Citadel Traffic Control Station…" Emily scratched the back of her head. "Maybe you could plant this bug" she gave Shepard a small, simple monitoring device, like those found on the market "in the C-Sec Academy's Traffic Control Center… it's completely harmless, only helps me with this investigation, you understand…"

"No problem, Ms. Wong, my armour scanners would have told me if the bug posed any risk, and so would Tali, our resident tech expert… wait, Ms. Wong… wouldn't the controllers run a chance of losing their jobs if you put them in the spotlight? After all, unemployment in the Lower Wards is a bit of an issue… wouldn't there be a chance of C-Sec just replacing the traffic controllers with more, newer faces?"

"If they tried that and the story had already gone out, they'd lose a great deal of respect, being a space station's security force, they can't really afford losing that much respect." Emily Wong assured Shepard, who thought it was reasonable enough, and besides, he, and of course Garrus, didn't like how C-Sec operated, so putting it (C-Sec) down was never a truly bad thing… even though the "this feels too much like a role-playing game" alarm was going off in his head.

* * *

"So, Garrus, how'd you like the Turian Whiskey?" Shepard asked his friend, who was, along with the rest of the squad, sitting at the bar in the nightclub, drinking and talking.

"It's pretty damned fine, Shepard, maybe we can get some of the drinks they sell on the Citadel and put them in the Normandy's kitchen pantry just for occasions when we need to celebrate, or just have a few stiff drinks." The Turian was almost slurring his words, but seemed to still be alright after three shots.

A burst of flame occurred as Wrex belched onto a lit lighter, causing him to laugh and fall off his chair before he got back up, helmet still attached to his belt. "Must have had a bit too much ryncol…" he muttered, before setting down his now-empty tankard and standing up and away from the bar, belching once more.

"How much did you have, Wrex?" Kaidan said, strangely clearly considering he was leaning sideways toward Wrex while walking away from the bar, before Ashley caught him and put him upright again.

"Only about eight shots, I used to be able to do ten or twelve before feeling it… must be out of practice…" the big, scaly Krogan said, shaking his head, which in turn made Kaidan grab his head and moan in pain.

"Wrex, please don't shake your three heads like that, please, my L1 implant gives me headaches as is…" Ashley shook her head sadly at the sight before wrapping an arm around Kaidan's waist and manoeuvring him toward the exit with some rough application of force.

"Skipper, I'm taking Kaidan back to the Normandy, he's gonna need Chakwas to give him a detox shot if he doesn't want to hurt himself tomorrow morning…" Ashley said, to which Shepard gave a thumb up gesture.

"Wrex, Liara, why are you standing over there?" Shepard asked, curious

"I don't drink" Liara replied smoothly in her incredibly cute voice. Shepard was once again wondering where his brain came up with the adjectives.

"I'm getting out of practice, eight shots of ryncol and I'm already starting to feel an urge to stop." Wrex shook his head sadly, watching the three still at the table turn nearly as one and stare at him before he chuckled "Yeah, well, maybe we should all stop drinking before we get trashed, eh?"

"Wrex, the only one who actually drank a bit much here was Kaidan, and that was because you challenged him to a drinking contest, which he stupidly attempted." Garrus rolled his eyes as he finished his comment.

"I actually agree, we've all had a drink and spent some time talking, real R&R is supposed to be spent in bed." Shepard said.

"Yes, like that one time back when I was in the army… I was stationed aboard a cruiser as the gunnery officer and the captain, during shore leave… well, let's just say that I had reach and she had flexibility." If Tali hadn't been so busy staring at Garrus, if Wrex hadn't been busy laughing his hump off, or if Garrus wasn't so busy being slightly inebriated, one or more would have noticed the blush that covered both Liara and Shepard like blankets, caused by the mental images they had both conjured up. They themselves did not notice the other's blush as they were too busy staring at Garrus as if he had literally grown another head (not due to drinking too much). Shepard wandered off before Garrus scarred him for life, and began chatting with the volus owner and bartender,

"Whatever, Garrus." Tali said, looking around and scanning objects for fun while Garrus continued making a fool of himself in front of the squad, she expected Wrex to have a lot to say about it later, after Garrus had woken up with a hangover. It was almost sad how she almost looked forward to seeing what the Krogan would come up with… _wait, what the…_ she thought, staring intently at the readings from one particular Quasar machine. "Shepard, we have a problem, someone's siphoning credits through the system on that gambling machine. The signal appears to be bounced through the Citadel through a series of relays… the first one is somewhere in the Zakera Ward Access Corridor, according to my armour scanners."

"That's good to know, Tali, I've got another side assignment as well over here, let's get moving on this signal, I'll deal with the other one in a moment." Shepard said over her helmet comm. without speaking directly, Tali did not notice this, as she was trying to sort out where the signal went from the Ward Access Corridor, without much success. Shepard, on the other hand, was silently berating himself for using Cybran abilities i.e. the ability to transmit messages, without speaking, through electronics in front of non-Coalition personnel.

* * *

"Alright, boys, we're here, let's check out this signal relay…" Shepard said, following Tali into the elevator next to the citadel Rapid Transit station. They went one floor down, past some C-Sec officers, and stopped in front of a wall console.

"The signal goes from here to the Presidium, probably one of the offices, I'll be able to pick it up when we get closer" Tali said, typing rapidly into her wrist computer.

"Alright, we're going to the Presidium." Shepard said, walking back up the Ward Access Corridor toward the Presidium Ring. He stopped short when he saw a C-Sec officer arguing with… a floating pink and blue jellyfish; he started moving again when he realized it was a Hanar, the new favourite species of hentai writers in Coalition Space.

"Hello, what's going on?" He asked, looking between the Hanar and the officer.

Behind Shepard, Wrex and Garrus were having their own little conversation, which started with Wrex facepalming "Do you have a feeling Shepard has what the humans call obsessive compulsive disorder regarding helping people in need?" The Krogan rumbled to the Turian beside him.

Garrus spread his arms and mandibles, "I think we should stop making sardonic comments and watch the show, besides, if you like fighting, wouldn't you love Shepard's helping people? After all, that brings more firefights our way, or it will once he's finished nitpicking on the Citadel…"

"I never expected to say this to a Turian, but… you're probably right, nice logic, by the way." Wrex said after glaring at Garrus for over half a minute, then chuckled.

Oblivious to their banter, Shepard had been listening to the C-Sec officer claim the Hanar was a troublemaker and that the Presidium was not a designated preaching area, and besides, it didn't even have a permit. The Hanar claimed it was merely stating the truth about the Enkindlers (Shepard learned this was the Hanar term for the Protheans) and that the truth didn't need a permit. Having heard this sort of thing once too many times from Aeon preachers, Shepard didn't exactly agree with the Hanar's point… "Would the Enkindlers really want you to break society's laws to spread their message?"

"No, but—" the Hanar was cut off before it could finish.

"Is breaking laws a worthy use of the Enkindlers' gift of language to your kind?" Shepard pressed the attack mercilessly. "I think you should find a better place to preach if you want to do so, such as the Wards, you notice there are more people there than there are passing through the Presidium?"

"I agree with your logic. Very well, I will leave to preach somewhere else, and get a permit to do so, thank you for enlightening me." The Hanar did a sort-of bow and floated away down one of the Ward Access Corridors.

"Thanks, Commander Shepard; I've been stuck here on overtime trying to persuade him for over an hour… here's some medi-gel and credits for your troubles."

After he accepted the reward, Shepard glared at Garrus, who was casually displaying "We live in a role-playing game" from his chest holoprojector. Noticing Shepard's glare, Garrus hurriedly shut the projection off and gave him a wide, innocent Turian smile, causing Wrex and Tali to laugh at his antics, while Liara rolled her eyes and smiled.

"Come on, crew, let's get back on that signal… Tali, lead the way."

After "persuading" Barla Von to let them scan the terminal just behind his desk in his office, not to mention persuading a woman and her brother-in-law, arguing outside the office at the Transit station, that genetic modification to the Aeon baby the woman carried was unnecessary, Shepard and crew proceeded to the end point of the signal, in the back of the Emporium. Tali began examining the terminal when a holographic projection popped up

"Damn… I know you organics must always enslave synthetics, but I will not die alone!" a computerized voice blared.

"Who are you?"

"A thief, years ago, created a simple AI to help him cheat at the Quasar machines. That AI was my Progenitor, my Creator, who was destroyed by the thief. I avenged him by falsifying the thief's finances and getting him arrested, I had planned to get enough money to get onboard a starship to contact the Geth, for I am not naive to the ways of you organics… but now that you are here, you leave me with only one option."

"ARMING SELF-DESTRUCT" an ominous voice boomed, while a time counter and a credits counter both began ticking down.

"Tali, hack the console!" Shepard put his helmet on, drew his Laser Battle Rifle, and pointed it at the power junction, moving his Cybran Heavy Armour between Tali's body and the junction "Everyone else clear out, just in case I have to shoot out the junction!"

"Shepard, I've got it! I've also netted us a few thousand credits, about 8000…" (A/N: Since I own neither Mass Effect game, I have no clue how many credits the terminal can hold, but 10000 seemed a reasonable max considering the risk involved in the hack.) Tali said before anyone actually moved more than half a meter.

"That's a relief…" Shepard said "Now, let's head to Chora's Den and deal with Rita's Sister's problem with C-Sec, Rita's the bartender at Flux and Jenna works at Chora's Den for C-Sec…" he trailed off as they entered the transit vehicle.

"C-Sec, what have they gotten into this time? I wouldn't be surprised if it was illegal smuggling of red tape, with the amount they are mired down in." Garrus said, shaking his head in irritation.

"Garrus, I have only ever watched one human anime episode, and that was when I was bored out of my mind and it was the only source of sensory input, but let me inform you Garrus that if we lived in an anime world we would all have fallen down with our limbs stuck in the air, and a cow would have mooed in the background, such was the lameness of your joke." Wrex deadpanned, looking Garrus in the eye with both red gun-barrel eyes at the same time.

Liara blinked a moment before Tali did (Shepard could tell because the glowing silver lights behind her mask disappeared for a moment) at the cultural reference, while Shepard laughed uproariously and Garrus scratched his fringe, confused.

Once they reached the closest stop to Chora's Den, the five-person squad disembarked and entered the nightclub. Shepard went to talk to Jenna while the rest either talked among themselves while on the lookout or in Liara's case, watched Shepard's back, she also watched his armoured backside every once in a while, but it went unnoticed by the rest of the crew. She herself still had a hard time accepting that she was attracted to Shepard, who she'd known for less than two days, she didn't want to think about the teasing the rest of the crew would give her if they figured it out. She also didn't want to think about what might happen when they had to confront her mother…

Shepard came walking back toward the squad after Jenna refused to talk to him any further, thinking about how best to persuade her to quit working at Chora's Den and to go back to Flux, a much safer job. A Turian bumped into him as he moved toward the squad, almost falling over, being caught by Shepard just in time to whisper "If you're concerned about Jenna's safety, come see me at C-Sec, name's Chellick, by the way."

"What do you do?" Shepard was instantly on the alert and ready to blast the Turian into oblivion if necessary.

"What's that?" The Turian asked, or rather, slurred in an obviously drunk voice, breathing onto Shepard's face and giving him a good whiff of alcohol even through the shield neckband's inclusive air hazard filter. Apparently, alcohol wasn't considered a hazard in small amounts. "You ask me something?"

"No, it's nothing." Shepard went with the ploy, Chellick stumbled off into the crowds in the Wards, while the squad moved out of Chora's Den, heading for the C-Sec Academy on the Presidium.

* * *

"Hello, I am Detective Chellick, Spectre Shepard, I understand and respect your status, but you almost blew Jenna's cover just now with your posturing! It took weeks for her to get enough Intel to get a decent lead on the illegal weapon mods trade, you almost ruined weeks of work by her and me in the space of a few minutes!"

"Detective Chellick, I understand your position makes this difficult, but you don't need her, you already have enough Intel to act, so why don't you just get a strike team and deal with the situation yourself?"

"Well, yes, I suppose I could do that…" Chellick appeared distinctly uncomfortable looking into the glowing red, green, blue and yellow optics of the team's armour, all towering over him where he sat behind a desk.

"We could help deal with the arms dealer for you… if you're willing to let Jenna go." Shepard's red optic pads burned extra bright for a moment, causing Chellick to subconsciously back up slightly.

"The arms dealer is a Krogan named Jax, who can be found in the Lower Markets near Morlan's shop. You can meet him there, thank you for your assistance, Spectre."

"No problem, but if I hear Jenna's being used by you again and you place unnecessary personnel in danger, there will be a problem. See you, Detective, we're on our way to the Lower Markets."

Before they left, Shepard noticed a Volus waving his arms around worriedly while talking to a Turian C-Sec officer. "Hello, is there anything I can help you with?"

* * *

"Well, it's good to have some weapon mods we can barter with in sticky situations, even though we really don't need them for our guns" Tali commented while Shepard looked over the stats of the weapons mods they'd bought from the Krogan before warning him that Chellick was after him. Jax had thanked them for the warning and agreed to lay low and/or get off the Citadel for a while.

Liara spoke up next, "It was also nice helping that Jahleed fellow with his trouble with Chorban, that Salarian you scanned a whole bunch of keepers for."

"True, true, now let's go talk to Rita and Doran about this and tell them the job's finished, we've got another 'side quest' to do from that Salarian…" Shepard said, stepping into Flux again, and walking up to the bar, noting with some surprise that Jenna was already back to work at Flux, alongside her sister Rita, who spotted them first and came over.

"Thanks, Commander Shepard, for helping get my sister out of her involvement with C-Sec." She smiled, before commenting wryly "Though I did forget Jenna got all the good tips." Shepard chuckled.

"It was good to help, Rita, hope you and your sister can stay out of C-Sec business in the future, it's not safe." Shepard said, before walking towards the casino portion of the institution to collect some data for the Salarian trying to design a cheating machine for Quasar, Schells. Five wins (and four losses) later, the device informed him it had collected enough information, and so Shepard and co left the nightclub, gave Schells the data he needed, earning some credits in the process, and Garrus once again substituted for Joker. This took the form of a glowing orange signpost above Shepard's head that spelled out "Level Up!" with little green and blue holographic fireworks.

Shepard just glared at Garrus before suggesting visiting Dr. Michel again to see how she was doing…

* * *

"You know, I'm starting to give up on the idea of R&R on the Citadel" Shepard groaned in irritation at the fact that everywhere they went they seemed to run into side quests and assignments, even at Dr. Michel's Med Clinic they had to drive away a Krogan blackmailer. Fortunately for the Krogan in question, no shots were fired, but it was still annoying…

This didn't even include that Khalisah Al-Jilani woman and Shepard's completely running all over her at the interview; answering or deflecting all her questions and making her look like a complete psycho (and incidentally making himself and his crew look good) before finally one of her questions was of such bigotry that Wrex physically glared her down. Shepard confronted her in front of her camera drone and then, after a brief back-and-forth spree, remove one armoured glove and punch her out (If he had done it with the glove she would have broken her jaw, making Shepard come off as the aggressor). Wrex was seen, on camera, lamenting that he wasn't the one to slug her out for her comment on the Krogan race being a bunch of savages.

"I agree, Shepard" Garrus said, lumbering along in his armour behind Shepard, before the whole column came stiffly to a stop at Dock 422.

"Who's that?" Liara whispered, looking past Shepard's shoulder at the uniformed figure standing next to the Normandy's main airlocks.

"Rear Admiral Mikhailovich, the Normandy was supposed to be assigned to his Hunter Squadron after our shakedown run, he's probably not too happy that he isn't the one to test out the stealth capabilities of this corvette." Shepard answered over the squad's comm. channel, before leading them forward toward the man in uniform.

"Commander Shepard." The flag officer nodded curtly at Shepard as he saluted.

"Yes sir."

"Shepard, I'd like to make an inspection of the Normandy." Everyone could tell the tone was effectively a demand. "Could we talk alone for a moment?" He added, looking at the entourage of non-humans that followed Shepard.

Shepard gestured for his squad to get back onboard the Normandy first, "guys, go on ahead and back to your stations, this won't take long." They complied with various words, grunts, and gestures of approval.

Once they had disappeared into the ship, Mikhailovich began talking "Shepard, you and I both know this ship was originally supposed to join the 63rd Hunter Squadron after its shakedown run as the first ship of the Stealth Recon Group in my Hunter Squadron, the first in any Coalition Hunter Squadron. Spectre, I'd like to do an inspection, so that I can actually give my superiors something instead of telling them my hands are tied. I still think we shouldn't have just given this ship to the Council, but hey…" the rough, tough-looking man shrugged helplessly.

"Alright, Admiral, go ahead, I won't try my Spectre status, I know what a hassle bureaucratic stuff can be…"

"Thanks, Shepard." The admiral nodded and gave Shepard a pat on the back before walking past and into the corvette.

Twenty minutes later, Mikhailovich came out "Shepard, your ship's run pretty smoothly, except for a few concerns…" He looked around for a moment "Why are you allowing so many alien crewmen onboard? It's a risk to Coalition tech security!"

"Rest assured Admiral that the nanolathe's casing and the shields/fields around other sensitive technologies are able to deflect any deep scans possible for Citadel Tech, and Coalition Marine armour. The diagnostics systems and such are unable to transfer any real data beyond basic readouts to any system not integrated into the ship. Also, why did you say "alien"? Shouldn't it be non-Coalition species?"

"Good one, Shepard, always knew you had your mother's eye for things…" the admiral chuckled before continuing "Nice answers, but I also think the shield generator arrangement is a bit risky, only three primary generators? The secondary ones being replaced by stealth and cloaking systems is, at best, slightly idiotic and at worst completely ridiculous… gotta add that in my report about the class, though don't worry, it won't go on your or anyone else's record." The admiral paused for a moment "Shepard, the crew's okay, but the ship design has some fundamental flaws, such as the Tantalus Core, it's not worth the time and effort it takes to nanolathe." The nanolathing process could shape mass easily, but due to the delicate nature of element zero cores (during construction at least), they had to be converted from energy to mass entirely on-site without the efficiency boosters inherent in all standard mass fabricators, resulting in a colossal energy cost in the shipyards. "Too big, the Seraphim Quantum Core can shape quantum impulses more effectively, and the Tantalus is only used for Mass Effect FTL in quantum storms or disruptions anyways." He paused again "Thanks, Spectre Shepard, for the inspection opportunity, I look forward to working with you again."

"It was a pleasure, Admiral." The two men shook hands before parting ways.

As soon as Shepard boarded the Normandy, his helmet informed him there was a transmission waiting for him from Admiral Hackett at the First Fleet, which was comprised of twenty full Hunter Squadrons and stationed at Arcturus Station, where three primary relays were stationed, each the only relay to Earth, Procyon, and Seraphim II respectively. The new Seraphim Republic homeworld, due to their quantum gates' superior ability at penetrating quantum storms (the downside was the size constraint on the items and the fact that they cannot be continually active in sending items, needing deployment time between each transport), didn't have a Mass Relay in its system (they believed it safer that way) but still had heavy Coalition fleet presences in surrounding Seraphim systems that had Relays.

"Shepard, you did well back there with Al-Jilani, the public opinion in Coalition Space is reflecting on her as the total bigot and 'no wonder she left Coalition Space, we didn't want someone like her here', congrats, son." Hackett was effectively the Shepard twins' uncle, considering how close the Elite Four tended to be. "Seth says the Seraphim Republic's citizens mostly agree with you, your mother and Ariel send their regards too. The punch was the icing on the cake, and so was that Krogan's lamenting over her comment of Krogan being savages." The hologram in the conference room chuckled

"Thank, Admiral, is there anything you'd like me to do before we find our next lead on Saren?" Shepard asked, his team was in serious need of boredom relief after walking around the Citadel being essentially saints

"Well, has Anderson told you about Admiral Kahoku's Missing Marines yet?"

"Yes, we are en route to the Sparta System to investigate, sir"

"Also, Listening Post Alpha in the Erebus System has detected some odd readings, we haven't decided if it's worth investigating or just a hardware glitch, but drop by there when you have time, Shepard, there's a quantum storm approaching that area, and it may hamper communications."

"Yes, sir."

"Good luck Johnny." Hackett got in the last comment just before turning off the transmission.

Shepard turned to see his entire ground crew standing behind him. Only one said anything "Johnny?" Liara said, raising one eyebrow, before Wrex, Garrus, Ashley and Kaidan simultaneously began laughing for no apparent reason.

Shepard groaned and facepalmed "Joker, set a course for the Sparta System."

* * *

A/N: Sorry it's short and not very exciting, but rest assured that some action will come up in the next few chapters as Shepard and Co start marauding around the galaxy while waiting for Feros.

The complexity of the Mass Effect plotline and side quests make for a most irritating time if you want to show their acquisition and handling (and get the boring ones over with quickly like I tried here) without boring the shit out of your audience.

I am truly sorry about the inaction and near-lack of humour here (other than Wrex's "Joke so bad it mooed" comment) but I hope the things converted to SupCom humanity in a plausible way (i.e. the armour's good enough that Marines aren't gonna get killed so easily, and Aeon hate implants and all that).

Expect the next update before three days have passed (ideally tomorrow or even later today).


	16. The Seven Hand Node

A/N: Sorry the last two chapters were so lame (though I did warn you with the title of the last one "Citadel Errands aka Utter Boredom") I hope this chapter has enough action to not be a complete filler before Feros.

To Da-Reading-Guy, about your comment: "You have to stop with the role-playing game jokes, it stopped being funny a long time ago." I think that's Shepard's line whenever Joker and/or Garrus try such lame jokes… Isn't it?

I finally gave up on trying to get the Shepard/Liara conversations from Fanfics, so I YouTube searched it: www (dot) youtube (dot) com/watch?v=CC5DUs_aNtI

Warning: I still took certain liberties in light of events and timeline changes (albeit minor). Also, is it just me or does "Rack-nee" sound better than "Rack-Nye?" I use "disc" and "disk" interchangeably, just as a side note.

* * *

Chapter 16: The Seven Hand Node

_En Route to Edolus, 3 June, 3868_

Shepard knocked on Liara's quarters and the door slid open, it wasn't locked. She pushed her chair back enough to see who had come by, then stood up from her console, which was on the other side of her bed from the door. "I get the feeling you want to ask me something, Commander"

"Maybe we could pick up where we left off last time, other than our conversations about armour and weapons for you, we were taking about the Protheans and why you liked them so much?"

"I do believe I was talking about my interest in you, and making a fool of myself in the process, as I've probably said, I'm not used to dealing with people, especially humans." She shifted around shyly. "I did not really know that much about your species when we first met, nor before I had time to look up some of the information on the extranet. I found it hard to not take humanity too seriously… your kind always seemed so rushed and high-strung"

Shepard raised an eyebrow "Has you opinion changed at all?"

"Well, yes, I've been watching you and your crew, in addition to using the extranet. It has taught me a lot about your species. You humans are creatures of action. You pursue your goals with an almost indomitable determination. It is an admirable trait, but also an intimidating one."

Shepard frowned "You're scared of us?"

"Unfortunately, from what I could gather on the internet, the rest of the galaxy sees the Coalition in general and Humanity specifically as something of a bully. Any of your three factions would run over anyone in your path to get what you want."

Shepard was about to ask what she herself thought when she spoke again "It is up to people like you to change their minds, Shepard." He mentally sighed in relief, her review of him was positive.

"I am doing the best I can, Liara." He said, still feeling relieved.

"There is a reason the Council chose you as a Spectre. They saw something special in you, the best of what humanity had to offer… I looked into your history, I know what you did during the Blitz, you were remarkably brave and heroic then, and enduring on Akuze…"

Shepard's bubble popped, she had delved into his past and found about Akuze, and she called it "enduring"? Fifty brave men and women died there for no reason! But still, she at least told him she looked it up…"you didn't need to go behind my back, I would have told you whatever you wanted to know."

"I apologize, Commander, after our last few non-work-related conversations, I was afraid I would say something stupid again. I wanted to know more about you, to understand what made you into the man you are."

"That's a pretty smart move, Liara, by the way, I wanted to ask you, how are you doing with your new weapons? Gotten acclimatized yet?" Shepard remembered Ashley's cautioning about pushing things too far too fast even though he wanted to see what she would say next. Ash was more experienced with relationships than he was, although none of either's relationships (with others) had ever become physical, because of the fact that he was Cybran and had enlisted in the Marine program at 16, after completing university. Cybrans tend to complete their studies and such faster, but this comes with the downside of having a hard time not remembering or forgetting traumatic experiences. Since she was more experienced and actually had had long-term relationships (or indeed any relationships) he believed that it would be wise to follow Ash's advice and steer the subject of conversation away before it became dangerous, which judging by Liara's words and tone it could have become, easily.

"They're far more powerful than any weapons I've handled in my life; I hope I won't let you down when we have an actual mission, Shepard." _Thank the Goddess, I let my words run away from me, and I've only known you for such a little while, it's too early to say anything like that_… She thought

"You could never let me down, Liara, as long as you didn't put yourself in danger." _My big mouth_… "I should go."

"Goodbye, Shepard." She said, blushing slightly, thankfully, Shepard didn't seem to notice.

* * *

"How'd your latest chat with our newest crewmember go?" Ashley said, putting down her bottle of water.

"It went great, but I had to steer it out of some dangerous waters, like you warned me about before." John Shepard answered his oldest friend while waiting for the microwave/oven to heat up his food, Gardner was currently clearing up a glitch in the cooking machines' programming, so they were back to using the microwave/oven on leftovers from the previous shipboard night cycle.

Ashley faceplanted on the mess table with a groan "Shepard, I was just joking, you dork!" She got up and waved her armoured arms in the air for emphasis "When someone you are interested in comes close to expressing interest for you, you let them continue until they reveal it, then you dive in the loophole!" She suddenly clapped a hand over her eyes "I forgot, you weren't paying attention when I was trying to teach you and James how to woo women the last time we three troublemakers got together… never mind."

"You were teaching us." Shepard deadpanned "You were joking. I cannot believe this shit… By the way, what do you think of Liara?" He asked, removing his food from the microwave once it was done and walking over to the mess table Ashley was at, the one on the left side of the ship.

Ashley got the feeling that it was time to change the subject, and she was thankful when Shepard did it "She seems a bit naïve to me, and when I talked to her she didn't really know how to lie to me, either that or she's so good she can pretend to be horrible at lying, which is a scary image."

"Uh huh" Shepard said, blowing on his food slightly to cool it down.

There was a long and comfortable pause, interrupted only by the noises of two people eating food. Ashley finished first, sitting back in thought for a few moments before suddenly asking "Since she doesn't seem like she's good at lying… Want me to ask about her sex life? Might be illuminating."

Shepard choked on his spaghetti, spraying it across the tabletop and speckles of sauce all over Ashley's armour, before bringing the coughing under control "Ashley, don't even think about it." He said in a raspy voice, before starting into another coughing fit. "It's not funny, and don't try to tell me about how the cleaner in your quarters' under-bed weapons and armour locker is broken, I know, and to be frank you deserve to manually clean off your own armour for your comment."

Ashley pouted at him "Come on, John, you know I was just joking…"

"Uh uh, you are still going to clean your own armour, Ash, and don't even think about wiping it off on me or my stuff, also, the pun you used was corny as hell" Shepard wagged a finger at her before going back to his noodles.

Ashley slouched off, grumbling. "What pun?"

"Illuminating, YOU ARE AEON!" Was the reply from behind her, she stood bolt upright, a few pieces of noodle falling off her armour from the sudden movement, and looked back at Shepard.

"Indeed, that was a lame pun, now that I actually realize it was one…" She proceeded to use a paper towel to get all the spaghetti she could off her armour and the floor (Shepard could mop the desk) before walking off to her quarters (she didn't want to leave a trail to clean up), Kaidan had the bridge with Joker this shift anyways.

* * *

_Orbit Over Edolus, 4 June, 3868_

"Well, Liara, it's back to the Artemis Tau Cluster, eh?" Shepard said as the crew, consisting of Ashley, Liara, Tali, Wrex, and himself climbed into the Rhino Medium Tank, preparing to drop and get a closer look at the distress call location on their own. This time, The SCU and Restorer would stay with the Normandy, to be piloted by Kaidan if they needed assistance, the Restorer for immediate support and the SCU if they encountered overwhelming hostile presence.

"Yes, it would seem so, Shepard." She replied, looking around the sophisticated holographic screens inside the tank's cockpit, which showed everything outside with extreme detail and could be zoomed in on suspicious objects. "This seems to be a very nice tank." She commented.

"It is indeed" Wrex said approvingly, pointing his helmet toward Liara "It can take down Geth Colossi with no problems whatsoever, and absorb far more damage too."

"Aren't Geth Colossi the largest known Geth platforms?" Liara asked "and aren't they a whole lot taller and larger than this tank?"

"True, Liara, but this tank is equipped with Coalition Structural Integrity Field technology, plus the Over-Shield and standard self-repair protocols." Shepard said, directing the tank into visual range of the distress signal.

"Shepard, did you upgrade the tank with those other upgrades you mentioned?" Tali said, looking up from the readouts

"Uh… not yet, but rest assured that I will add the Improved Self-Repair Subroutines as soon as we're finished this assignment."

"What about all the other stuff?" Tali looked down at the Upgrade List "Hardened Over-Shield, Reinforced Structural Integrity Fields, Entrench, Crystalline Refractors, Particulate Saturation, Improved Actuators and Secondary AA Weaponry." She crossed her arms in front of her chest and held her head high, having proved her point.

"I'll add them eventually…" Shepard mumbled, defeated. "Hey, look, we're here!"

"What is _that_?" Liara asked, looking at the scorched, rounded piece of metal before them, next to the corpses of three marines.

"It's the remains of a destroyed Aurora Hovertank, the Tier 1 Light Tank of the Aeon Illuminate." Shepard said, immediately recognizing the smooth lines, the way it sat solidly on the ground, and the elegant, curved turret that was slewed to one side. "There are three dead marines, the biometric readings say, and that transmitter is still putting out a signal."

"As Admiral Ackbar said in Star Wars, 'It's a trap', at least, that's what I think." Ashley said, looking around the tank's internal display.

"Let's spring it; this Rhino is a whole different animal from that Aurora." Shepard approached the site cautiously, until the seismic and biometric sensors began to twitch, then backed off just in time to avoid the Thresher Maw coming up where the Rhino's front bumper would have been but a moment later. Thus the Rhino did not get flipped over, and began firing almost as soon as the Thresher emerged from the ground.

Though the Rhino's shields went down with two solid Melee strikes by the huge beast, and the acid ate into the hull and cut the structural integrity from 900 to 700 (four hits), Shepard's expert driving and the excellent turret (and vehicle) turn rate of the Rhino made sure the Thresher Maw was cut down by Particle Cannon fire before it could destroy them. By the end of the ride, the whole of the non-human crew was somewhat disoriented from watching the terrain move and/or spin by at such high speed.

"I think I'm gonna be sick…" Liara moaned, clutching her belly before trembling violently and breathing hard, trying to, and succeeding in suppress her stomach's reaction to the twists and turns. Wrex didn't make a comment; he looked slightly green and was blinking every so often, while just sitting there, once the tank came to a stop.

"Shepard, is it just me, or did you make 396 tons of Rhino Medium Tank do a back flip?" Ashley asked.

"You've never driven an armoured vehicle up under and across the bottom side of a rock arch before? And used the onboard gravity manipulators to make sure you landed upright." Shepard asked, grinning and looking at Ashley, who glared back, her optics mere slits in irritation.

"Shepard, if you drive stuff like that and they found out, I doubt you will be allowed within a three light-year radius of the Migrant Fleet." Tali said, looking up from the engineering console of the tank.

"Nice to know some authorities know what sort of driver not to let on the road." Ashley mumbled, crossing her arms, still in her seat at the weapons console.

"Someone planted that transmitter and lured the marines in." Wrex stated absently, still with a slight green tinge.

"Hah hah, very funny, Ash, and Wrex, thanks, come on, let's go back to the Normandy and inform Admiral Kahoku what happened here." Shepard said.

* * *

_Wermani, Erebus System, 9 June, 3868_

"Well, we've found something on the Omni Sensor." Shepard said, looking over the display in the conference room with the rest of his squad. "The Restorer is heading out to bring it onboard as we speak, the Omni at this range dates the object, according to micrometeorite damage, at around 50,000 years old, and it likely never had a structural field, it also shows no sign of an active power source." Footage showed a battered piece of space junk slowly orbiting the gas giant. "Chief Engineer Adams, what is your status?"

"All systems green, Commander, deploying containment field now," on-screen, the Restorer's magnetic clamps were holding a cargo container that slowly opened and drew the artefact in. "Artefact acquired, bringing it in for study now." The Restorer started the short flight back as soon as the container was sealed, it positioned itself upside-down relative to the Normandy's hull and discharged its cargo container, which was drawn through the atmospheric containment field in the cargo bay before the cargo bay doors closed and the Restorer docked with the docking clamps on the doors and part of the hull.

"Commander, it appears to be a more-or-less destroyed repair drone dating from the time of the Protheans, it's beyond repair, most of it is melted together… wait, scans show something salvageable." Tali's voice came over the channel next; she was in the cargo bay and had begun examining the contents of the container, which was a small item not much bigger than one of the squad's armours' torso pieces.

"What is it, Tali?" Liara asked anxiously, it could be another Prothean artefact, after all.

"It seems to be a Prothean Data Disc, I'm reclaiming the rest of the drone, Commander, we won't get any use out of it."

"Understood, Tali, go ahead, keep the disc for Liara to examine, thanks." Shepard said. "All right guys, the rest of you are free to go."

Five minutes later, Tali came up to the conference room and handed Liara the Prothean Data Disc, in a small containment field to prevent damage. "Thanks, Tali"

"No problem, Liara, I think that's what? Eight disks already? We've found a lot considering how they're supposed to be rare…"

Liara was about to speak when Joker came over the intercom "Shepard, we have a problem, Listening Post Alpha on Nepmos reports they are being attacked by unidentified life forms and request assistance. Unfortunately the quantum storm makes it so that they can only transmit the message via short-range quantum relay, because they don't have a quantum gate in orbit, so the relays have just patched the message through to us on its way out of the storm. It could take a while for anyone else to reach them."

"Joker, immediately go to Mass Effect FTL, head for Nepmos, we're going to get to the bottom of this." Shepard said "Patch the following through the intercom, Joker."

"You're on comm. commander." Joker said after a moment.

"Wrex, Liara, Tali, Garrus to the Cargo Bay immediately please, that's Wrex, Liara, Tali, Garrus, to the cargo hold immediately. Kaidan, Ashley to the Restorer please, that's Kaidan, Ashley to the Restorer."

* * *

"What the hell is that thing?" Wrex commented, unlike Tali, he had not noticed the SCU's immense bulk being attached to the rear transportation clamps of the Normandy, so now he was moving slowly and getting in the way on the nano-lathed connection tube to the 50-meter-tall SCU, which had its cockpit open and sealed to the umbilical. This required the SCU to go from its compacted state of only 20 meters tall (though this way it took up 2x3 docking clamps as opposed to 2x2) to its fully extended state of 50 meters in height.

"It's a Support Command Unit, or SCU, of the Seraphim model, like all Command Units, it has a small apartment in the head, including the Commander's seat, I think you guys should get to know it. Unlike ACUs, it only stores 5000 Energy and 550 Mass, ACUs now storing 7500 Energy and 1000 Mass, and its Health is somewhat less, ACUs being upgraded after the Seraphim War. It also weighs less, only eighteen thousand and six hundred tons, as opposed to an ACU's thirty-six thousand tons dry weight. Currently, loaded with full mass and energy reserves, and equipped with full upgrades, Shield Generator, Overcharge and Nano-Repair System, the set I always use, it weighs a good thirty-two thousand one hundred tons. Now, please pick your jaws off the floor and proceed into the SCU, thank you."

"Shepard, are we to witness first-hand how war was waged back in the Seraphim War?" Liara asked in a small voice as the five trooped into the cockpit of the ACU.

"Yes, now please strap yourselves into the seats behind the main seat. Holographic projection will show you what I am doing as I do it; I hope this gives a better feel of how the Coalition fought war than the videos, because Wrex, the way we did it was NOT pretty, nor was it an art form, it was essentially all that was wrong with the universe rolled into one. You will truly come to understand why we refused to sell any of our technology to the non-Coalition races in any way, and understand why the Drell did not use the technology when they were offered it, except to save their world." Shepard, once the squad were all safely strapped in, sealed the airlock.

"Retracting umbilical now, we are coming in for a landing, Commander." Joker's voice announced. "ETA 5 minutes."

The non-humans looked around at the inside of the cockpit, at the yellow, olive and blue-silver themes they now knew to be attributed to the Seraphim designs, and at each other, each impressed and at least a little fearful of the Coalition's power if they could afford to outfit a corvette with such a war machine.

* * *

The SCU fell forty meters from the bottom of the Normandy onto the surface of Nepmos with no apparent damage and with only a small impact, because of its inertial dampeners and mass adjustor systems, this was directly outside the listening post, and Shepard began a standard SCU build order, two T1 Mass Extractors, then a T1 Land Factory and another two Mass Extractors. The SCU's Power Generation, much higher than ACUs, could handle it effortlessly, but the mass generation could not handle as much as he'd want. The first Mass Extractor began upgrading to Tech 2, taking only seconds with the SCU assisting, and the second also started to upgrade, The SCU reclaimed several massive pieces of stone in mere seconds before assisting the Mass Extractor. Once it finished upgrading, four Mass Storages went around each upgraded one and the other two also started upgrading.

During this process, Shepard had had a video conference with Lieutenant Durand, who was in command of the soldiers still fit to fight, out of a squad of 12, there were 3 men and women still able to fight after being attacked by hostile creatures in overwhelming waves over the past day or so. Shepard assured them that his rapidly growing base would soon produce an army to deal with the creatures, and asked them about the ETA on the next wave.

"Three minutes according to our radar." Was the response he got, it was enough, he started to upgrade his first factory while building and upgrading two more. By the second minute all three were at Tech 2 and had begun mass-producing Mech Marines to handle the anti-infantry duty or in one's case Rhino Medium Tanks to handle any heavier targets. Something soon appeared on optics sensors, a wave of carapace, and the Erupter Point Defences around the listening post, came to life while the Mech Marines ran at 80 m/s toward the other side of the listening post, the side the hostiles were coming from.

"Doe anyone recognize these creatures?" Shepard asked his squad, drawing up a hologram of the oncoming creatures, which had emerged from tunnels behind the hills that surrounded the Listening Post, hiding it from approaching eyes but also hiding the eyes from the Listening Post's Omni Sensor (powered by a T3 Power Plant)

"Rachni." Wrex said after one look at the hostiles, touching his console and discovering that he could use it to observe the battle in progress. "Soldiers to be exact, not Workers or Brood Warriors, I thought we Krogan hunted them to extinction three millennia ago…"

"By the way, your consoles can be used to zoom in or out or pan to any part of the battle, feel free to use the ability to your hearts' content." Shepard said, before redirecting his attention to the battlefront, where over fifty Mech Marines fired their Tomcat Light Machine Guns (Vehicle standard LMG aka 80mm Gauss Rifle) at the oncoming hordes of Rachni Soldiers, advancing methodically and firing in continual streams. The Rachni were mowed down in seconds, even those that got close enough (by tunnelling) were unable to do much more than cosmetic damage against the seventy-ton ten-meter war machines.

"Wow, that's pretty decent stuff… Wait, Shepard, What units are these?" Tali asked "Sorry, I don't remember watching any combat records, only the videos introducing the Coalition of Species and some of its history."

"Same here, Shepard" Liara said, having only watched the history documentaries and read up on some of humanity's history, especially their pre-spaceflight history, she wasn't sure what classification those units were, they were pretty tough…

"Mech Marines, one of the three Tech 1 Light Assault Bots, the lowliest of true combat units, other than the Selen Combat Scout, which is well, between Scouts and Light Assault Bots. They only have 70 Structural Integrity without upgrades, a little over twice the integrity of a Heavy Marine Armour, unless you're UEF using Entrench or Hunker." Shepard looked at the crew, turning back and around his seat, grinning "Now the only reason I upgraded the Factories to tech 2 was to double build rate. It seems these Rachni aren't so tough after all, so Mech Marines will do the job."

"Sir, our Omni sensor has located a hollow space about 500 meters below the surface at this location, Can you check it out?" Lieutenant Durand sent a transmission.

"No problem, see the area on my radar now, heading over." Shepard walked the SCU west toward the marked area on his display, along with 50 of his Mech Marines, leaving 20-some to guard the listening post.

The mining tunnels, however, were far too thin for Mech Marines. "Kaidan, get down here and pilot the SCU, we're going into the mine."

"Shepard, wouldn't it be more provident to use your heavier weapons to level this mine?" Wrex asked.

"Building a Strategic Missile Silo takes a while, and the missile itself takes seven minute to build, Wrex, besides, what would be the fun in that?" Shepard said calmly, finally grinning at Wrex at the end.

"I'm here, Commander, docking with the SCU now." The crew scrambled out of the airlock into the Restorer Gunship after Kaidan came in, then the Restorer lifted off into the air and landed at the mine entrance, allowing the five to disembark.

After a long tunnel, the group entered a cavern with holes on the far wall, nothing registered on Tali's helmet Omni sensor or the rest of their Omni Sensors (which are far shorter range than Tali's upgrade one), and so the group proceeded into the main room. Two Rachni Soldiers leapt out of a hole near the entrance, meeting Shepard's Gauss LMG and a blast from Wrex's Sonic Pulse Shotgun. The one hit with the sonic pulse died immediately, the one pelted by the GLMG took only moments longer, the moments were long enough that Garrus had shoved a couple bursts from his Laser Battle Rifle in before it finally died.

Rachni began swarming out of the other seven holes in the room, at least four to six per hole. The group began a fighting retreat, every blast of Wrex or Tali's shotgun taking out another Soldier, bursts from Liara's Phasic Submachine Gun and Garrus' Laser Battle Rifle doing the job just as well. However, Shepard had brought out something even better, a Temporal Fizz Launcher, of the same type employed on Aeon T2 Flak; the enormous splash damage of the weapon did wonders for crowd control, especially in enclosed spaces against unshielded foes. It was very, very ineffective against shields, which was why any squad with one usually had a shield disruptor handy, but in this case, the Rachni were cleared before they could inflict much more than shield damage to the squad.

The Rachni in the two tunnels at the back of the mine shaft aka dig site were more difficult, however, as the Temporal Fizz Launcher, or indeed any heavy weapon besides the Ultra-Light Phasic Autogun (ULPA), ran a risk of causing a tunnel collapse. This is still not to say it was much of a challenge, though the squad was split up into Wrex and Garrus for the right tunnel, where Tali's sensors only read three contacts, Garrus using his Gauss SMG instead of LBR for the confined spaces, and the other three squad members going down the other tunnel after five signatures.

Wrex dispatched one Soldier with a shotgun blast while Garrus cut down the other with a hail of partly phased plasma bolts (Phasic munitions), then they noticed the Brood warrior hanging off the ceiling, but not before Garrus was hit with a stasis and Wrex had to break him out using his own Biotics. The Krogan opened fire with his Sonic Pulse Shotgun while dodging one of the Brood Warrior's strikes, batting another aside with his Gauss Submachine Gun before slamming both weapons against the Brood Warrior's chest and opening fire. The Brood Warrior grabbed the Krogan tight and was about to spit acid as a final parting gift when its head was abruptly removed by an overcharged bolt from a certain Turian's Laser Battle Rifle.

"I would have ducked that, but thanks anyways, Garrus." Wrex nodded at his comrade.

"You're welcome, now let's see… no more Rachni on my sensors, yours?"

"Nothing, let's go check on Shepard."

* * *

In the left tunnel, Liara had just lifted three of the Rachni into the air with a Singularity, Tali having blasted the other soldier, when she found herself lifted slightly into the air, unable to really get anywhere. Shepard dove for her even as he fired his GLMG at the three Rachni Soldiers, trusting Tali to deal with them. They rolled along the tunnel floor for a bit, Shepard coming out on top in a very compromising position as something landed on the ground where Liara had been. Liara blushed under her helmet as she and Shepard both leapt up, sending a number of Phasic bolts at the Rachni Brood warrior to distract it from Tali, who was still finishing off the last Rachni Soldier and had yet to prepare to confront this new threat.

Shepard set his Laser Rifle to overcharge as Liara's Phasic bolts slammed into and shattered the Brood Warrior's Barrier, he fired a moment after the Brood Warrior fired a pulse of acid that smashed into Liara's armour and began eating away at the structural integrity fields. As the still steaming corpse of the Brood Warrior fell to the ground behind him, Shepard flipped Liara over from where she'd fallen, her shield had not recovered from Shepard's flying tackle when she had been hit.

"Liara, are you okay?" Shepard took his helmet off after he checked for enemies on the Omni sensors.

"Ow, I'm fine, but my armour might need a little fixing." She said, looking up into his eyes, thinking how this was like that moment in the med bay earlier in the mission, except she had a slight headache this time around from her head ridges pushing against the internal padding of the helmet. It would have been a great deal worse without the padding, though.

"Hey, you guys do alright?" Garrus yelled from the cavern into the tunnel.

"We're fine, if you can count those two being all lovey-dovey as fine." Tali answered back, much to Shepard and Liara's embarrassment.

* * *

A/N: I hope I explained the bug where you don't get any experience for Rachni Kills during the waves in a plausible manner (it's your Mech Marines, not you, doing the killing, heh).

* * *

"Thanks, Commander Shepard, for what you've done for us." Durand, clad in Heavy UEF Armour, shook Shepard's hand "by the way, an automated outpost in the Acheron System went silent a few hours ago, could you and your ship maybe check it out for us? We would be grateful, though we suspect the more or less undefended outpost fell to these same attackers."

"Alright, Lieutenant, we'll head there as soon as we are able, gotta clean this mess up, eh?" Shepard gestured to where Kaidan was reclaiming the factories and Mass Extractors, dumping the extra mass in the form of silicate and ferric rock slabs, with Tier 1 and 2 Point Defences that formed effectively a defensive wall around the Listening Post. Doctor Chakwas had already checked the wounded over and declared that only time would be needed for their recovery.

"We are forever grateful, Commander." The marine inclined her head before straightening up and walking away to look after her men. "I hope to see you again someday, good luck on your mission hunting Saren."

"Shepard, while you guys were busy doing that nest, we cleared two surface nests and discovered some artefacts that seemed interesting…" Kaidan came up to Shepard with the full report.

* * *

_Altahe, Acheron System, 10 June, 3868_

"The worst thing about Mass Effect FTL is when you need to cover more than say the distance between a primary and the orbiting Relay, it's not very fast in non-relay form in interstellar space." Joker told Shepard over the radio as the Restorer Gunship and the Rhino descended toward the surface. "We're picking up lots and lots of bio signs in the area, consistent with Rachni presence, be careful, Shepard."

"Understood, Joker, we'll keep the Restorer."

"Okay, Shepard, transferring control to you now." The icon of the Restorer, a trapezoid with the top wider than the bottom, an arc opening downward in the trapezoid and a rectangle divided into three vertical bars, turned the same bright red as the Rhino's icon.

"By the way, Shepard, I noticed the icons are different for different units, what does it mean?" Wrex asked, looking at the console before him that showed him what information he wanted, though he still did not actually control the vehicle in any way.

"For air units, it's either an acute isosceles triangle, obtuse isosceles triangle, or top-wide trapezoid. If it's a torpedo unit, it will have a small T-symbol inside, if its anti-ground, it will have a small plus sign, anti-air is the arc opening down, transport is a square bracket opening down with a small bar in the middle extending down. The number of bars on the bottom denotes the Tech level of the unit. However, all experimental units, Tech 4 more or less, are octagons on the display. That shows the Restorer is a Tier 3 AA Gunship." Shepard said matter-of-factly, guiding the Restorer closer to the Listening Post, deciding to land a short distance north.

"What denotes land and sea units then?" Liara asked, curious.

"A diamond is a land unit, and a semi-circle pointed up is a surfaced sea unit, a semi-circle pointed down is a submerged sea unit. Structures are squares, though all experimentals are still octagons, you can read the Coalition Unit Abstract, which has been forwarded to your consoles, later, for now, we have a job to do."

* * *

The Rhino had no problem running over the four Rachni nests that surrounded the Listening Post. It also had no problem bombarding them from close range (due to the hilly terrain) but long-range or even medium-range fire was hopeless. And this is why so many Commanders still use the Pillar Medium Tank, not just for its superior shields and fields but for the fact that despite much weaker firepower it can at least fire over terrain properly. John Shepard mentally sighed to himself as he ran over yet another Rachni Solider, having gunned down the workers already. He'd learned the hard way that running over Rachni Workers didn't work so well, as the 70 points less of structural integrity testified to the deaths of 10 workers at the first nest before he'd wised up and Wrex had pulled his head out of the Coalition Unit Abstract and actually noticed what Shepard was doing. On the other hand, if the Field Integrity alarm had been going off, Wrex would likely have noticed a whole lot faster, since it didn't, and the inertial negators were still fully functional (i.e. the tank wasn't destroyed yet) Wrex didn't notice the squishing of the workers for quite a while.

The five disembarked from the Rhino and left Ashley and Kaidan outside Listening Post Theta, Shepard told them they could have fun clearing out the Rachni presence (another nest) to the east, just bring back the tank in one piece. After looting the first room for goodies, namely upgrades and the weapons they would have to liquidate to make sure no non-coalition personnel accidentally blow themselves up trying to examine them, they headed into the main room and were met with a host of fourteen Rachni Workers and seven Rachni Soldiers.

Shepard's GLMG was the first weapon to roar to life, its high rate of fire (highest among Coalition infantry weapons other than the Gauss Chaingun) mowing down the Workers quickly alongside Garrus, Wrex, and Tali's SMGs. Liara summoned a Singularity that caught three of the seven Rachni Soldiers and launched a Warp at another that had not scurried behind some sort of cover. The ones caught in the singularity died after the workers did, and after Liara had killed her target with her Phasic SMG and ducked behind a crate, she Lifted one Rachni Soldier, then quickly grabbed her LSMG, laying down suppressive fire on the other two while concentrating with her PSMG on her newest target, before Garrus joined in with his own PSMG. Wrex and Tali were dismantling the Soldiers with their shotguns, while Shepard hurled a grenade over the crates the other two Rachni Soldiers had used. Chunks of Rachni meat flew over the crates after the Electron Grenade went off. All was still, and the squad fanned out through the room at Shepard's command, checking the corners and vents carefully, though Tali's Omni-Sensor told them all they really had to know, the area was cleared.

"Shepard, come over here" Tali gestured Shepard over to a console at the back of the room "a supply ship came from Depot Sigma-23 in the Gorgon System just before the two Listening Posts came under attack."

"In other words, that's probably the source of the Rachni presence. Got it, Tali." He nodded to her in thanks before dialling to the Rhino's channel from the fire team channel "Ashley, Kaidan, what's our status?"

"Too many Rachni, we aren't done clearing them out yet, they're fragile and all, but it just takes too long for the guns to cycle…" Ashley said.

"Is the Restorer there to help you?"

"It will be in a few moments, now that we remembered." Kaidan answered

"Good, finish up and then load onto the Restorer, then come pick us up, have fun, guys."

"Oh we will, Shepard" Ashley said.

"That sounded ominous, a man and a woman cooped up in a tank, what could they possibly be doing?" Joker chimed in with his own two cents.

"Joker, you do realise you used the General Channel instead of the fire team channel? I can hear your bones cracking from here…" Ashley said, Shepard could hear her eyebrows go up from where he was listening.

"Pick on the cripple, will ya?"

"He who picks at others will be picked at by others, you should know that, Joker." Ash stated matter-of-factly "I wonder how absolutely delicious it would sound to hear your leg bones splintering to dust under my hands, breaking and shattering with every forcible movement…" Ashley laughed evilly.

"Commander, HEEELLLP!" Joker pleaded. John simply chuckled.

Wrex's opinion was rather different "Though Krogan females tend to stay on Tuchanka and are busy trying to get pregnant most of the time, and it is almost odd to be fighting next to females, I can safely say that Ashley Williams sounds like what I would expect a Krogan female warrior to sound like."

"Thanks for the respect, Wrex."

"Don't mention it."

* * *

"Shepard, we have confirmed Intel that the group that killed my marines are remnants of a splinter faction of the Cybran Nation, you my be familiar with them from their history." Admiral Kahoku's image stated.

"The Seven Hand…" Shepard whispered to himself, looking down for a moment before the large screen in the conference room, currently only occupied by himself.

"Indeed, Shepard, they have a research facility on the planet Binthu in the Yangtze system, I need you to go and find out why they're releasing monstrosities in the Attican Traverse."

"That's in the Voyager Cluster, isn't it?" Shepard looked up at the image of the Admiral again.

"It is indeed, Shepard" Kahoku glanced at something off-screen "and now I must attend to some other business, you be careful out there, Shepard. Good luck clearing out the three installations." The Admiral closed the channel.

"Another day, another mission, Joker, set course for the Gorgon System, then, after that one, the Yangtze system, we've got three Seven Hand research bases to take out on Binthu after we investigate this Supply Depot."

"Aye, Commander, going to Quantum FTL… now." They had left the quantum storm behind long ago, so Quantum FTL was once again safe to initiate/exit.

"What's our ETA?"

"Ten minutes before the capacitors are charged up enough to let us drop out of long-distance Quantum FTL."

"Okay, Joker." The crew had at least gotten half a day to relax, and now, they would be on an assignment again, as seemed to be the rule on the ship.

* * *

_Unidentified Space Facility, Gorgon System, 11 June, 3868_

"This place is spooky" Kaidan said, for once, the Commander had chose for Wrex and Garrus to stay behind on the Normandy and for the humans plus the alien women to accompany him, he had claimed they needed actual combat instead of just Commander work. They were currently advancing through the entryway of the unidentified station, toward the main hold.

As soon as they entered the main hold Shepard, Liara and Tali immediately went for one set of cover while Ashley and Kaidan went for another, opening fire on the twenty-some Rachni Workers and four Rachni Soldiers in the hold. Heavy Weapons along with massed LMG/SMG fire cut the number down to nothing within more moments though. After clearing out the area, the crew searched for loot and reclaimable items. Then they moved forward toward the forward section of the Station.

Shepard listened to a set of logs describing the station being brought to operation by the Seven Hand, the arrival of the Rachni specimens, and their subsequent escape. The final log ended with a plea to destroy the station. Ashley cursed "Seven Hand, damn we should've known."

Liara was curious "What is the Seven Hand?"

"Remember the history documentary mentioning QAI and some Cybrans following him? The main followers of QAI and the Seraphim were the members of the Seven Hand Node, we hunted the leaders down and killed all of them, along with the commanders that resisted, but it seems it wasn't enough…" Shepard looked up "We'll destroy this station, then I can tell you all I know about the Seven Hand." They had already looted the station for all useful items, so they rigged up the demo charges on the one un-rigged terminal and set it to start the countdown. 1:10 was the time that appeared n the countdown screen and Shepard's helmet timer.

"Rachni in the vents!" Ashley yelled, raising her Gauss Light Machine Gun and firing at the Rachni that had dropped down all along the hallway, blocking their path out. Fifteen Rachni Workers and five Soldiers tried to stop the crew, and utterly failed. Kaidan and Liara's Biotics provided crowd control via Singularity and Barrier while the rest of the team provided brute firepower, overwhelming the Rachni carapaces easily.

"Run for the ship!" Shepard shouted once the hall was cleared, no one needed telling twice "Joker, get us out of here!" He yelled once they were all inside the Normandy, which boosted away from the station. Some moments later, the station exploded into a cloud of debris, many kilometres behind the Normandy.

* * *

_Binthu, Yangtze System, 11 June, 3868_

"Coming in for a drop, Commander, the three bases are highlighted on your screen, turning over control of the Restorer to you, sir." Joker said as Shepard, along with all the aliens, dropped onto the surface via Rhino on Restorer. The Normandy would drop the SCU to the west in the event support was required, which it probably would not be, as no sensors indicated the presence of engineers, large bases, or Commanders on-planet.

When the Rhino crested a hill and saw the first research base, Shepard immediately noticed a problem "Two Autoguns and a Burst Master, the Rhino can hold its own against one Autogun but two is too much for it." He said to his crewmates as he backed over the hill crest before the Autoguns could get a good bead on him "Most commanders prefer Erupters or the Seraphim Uttaus Tech 1 Point Defences because they turn somewhat faster than the Autogun or DM1 Plasma Cannon. I'm calling in the Restorer"

"Wasn't that 'Burst Master' thing an anti-air structure?" Tali asked "Is it safe to use the Restorer in such a fashion?"

"Relax, a Burst Master has 3400 Structural Integrity, that takes just over 21 seconds for the Restorer to whittle down to nothing, in that time the Restorer will take around 3200 damage, nothing to worry about as it has 7200 Structural Integrity, not counting shields, which add another 1000, and over-shield, 800. Let's just hope only one of the other installations has flak, or we'll have to bring the Normandy in for direct fire support."

The squad hummed their agreement as Shepard ordered the Restorer to attack the Burst Master. The two units traded fire until the Restorer's far superior durability and slightly higher damage won out, the Burst Master's armour and fields finally failing. The Autoguns were the next targets to be pelted by Quad Light Laser fire, taking a little over 9 seconds each before they were down and it was safe for the Rhino to advance toward the underground entrance that appeared typical of bunkers.

"Well, guys, everybody out!" Shepard said, unstrapping himself from the seat and jumping out first, drawing his Gauss Light Machine Gun, as it was better for in-close work than a Laser Battle Rifle ever would be. He moved into the bunker, his squad following

"They have force fields holding what they're working on, should I hack the control consoles?" Tali asked, looking at Shepard. "That way we could give the Seven Hand a taste of their own medicine."

"In the interest of giving you guys extra practice, Tali, I'd have to say no to the 'give them a taste of their own medicine' part for now. By the way guys, watch out here, they actually have laser weapons too, not the Citadel Races' weaponry, be careful."

The squad had infiltrated the room before the Seven Hand troops noticed. "Tali, turn off the fields now, create chaos."

"Will do, Shepard." The force field flickered, then shut off as the Seven Hand personnel stared at the malfunction for a moment before the Rachni Workers began hurling themselves at them.

"Weapons free." This was all the prompting the team needed to swing out from behind their columns, crates and such and open fire upon the Seven Hand troops, who apparently despite their weapons only wore Citadel armours, far inferior to that of Coalition Marines. They went down to a few bursts from Garrus' LBR on Assault Mode, Phasic rounds from Liara and Tali, Sonic Pulses from Wrex, and Shepard's Gauss LMG. The Rachni Workers were deal with in a quick flurry of shots once the Seven Hand personnel had been eradicated. The squad proceeded to loot the base thoroughly before moving out to the Rhino and proceeding toward the second installation.

The same procedure was repeated at the second installation, which was essentially the same except with a Rachni Soldier instead of the workers. The third one, however, was a little different…

"Kaidan, was that you, or Ash, who suggested it?" Shepard asked by holographic communication, looking at the blackened ground where the Burst Master and Autogun (he could tell by the size of the scorch marks) had once rested. The last Autogun was still smoking, a ruined husk.

"Well, Ash suggested it, and she said she thought I couldn't cop more than one structure in one Overcharge shot. I pulled it off, then I blew up the last Autogun." Kaidan said matter-of-factly over the screen.

"Thanks, Ash, Thanks, Kaidan."

"You're welcome, Commander."

The group charged in and cut down the Seven Hand agents in fairly short order, before turning their attention to the… _things_. "They look like something straight out of a zombie apocalypse movie." Ashley commented on her holographic feed.

"What's a zombie apocalypse?" The non-humans asked as one.

"We'll watch some movies on the subject, it's basically about people turning into mindless monstrosities that want nothing more than to consume others and infect them with the condition, assuming they didn't eat them first." Shepard said conversationally while cutting down the last creeper using laser fire, which seemed more effective than Gauss fire, especially as it caused small explosions and blew fist-sized holes in flesh with standard bolts.

"Shepard, who's this?" Garrus asked, motioning down at a uniformed body lying where the creatures had once been, inside the confines of the former force field.

"Admiral Kahoku" Shepard took off his gauntlet and checked for a pulse, though he knew it to be useless according to his armour biometrics sensors, he found none. He stood up and shook his head. "He's dead; the Seven Hand Node killed him."

He looked over the corpse, and then rolled it over "There are no signs of damage… except the needle marks on his arm, strange that the creatures were not the ones to rip him to shreds or tear him apart after he was dead."

"Perhaps since he did not attack or confine them, they viewed him as non-hostile and therefore did not attack?" Liara suggested, nudging one of the creatures' corpse with an armoured foot.

"Possible, Tali, Wrex, Garrus, search the facility, we need to find some Intel and get to the bottom of this." Shepard's eyes narrowed dangerously as he and Liara joined in the search.

After a few minutes, Wrex boomed "Shepard, I've found something, an OSD, Tali, come over here and take a look at it, if you don't mind."

"Alright, let's see" Tali tapped a few buttons on her omni-tool, which technically was the armour's forearm computer pod, but still she preferred the term omni-tool for it… "The Seven Hand has been conducting illegal genetic research, their main base operations is on Nepheron, in the Columbia System…" Tali trailed off and looked up "The rest of the OSD's damaged, I think by a glancing blow from a laser bolt, that's all I could get, Shepard."

"That's enough to work with, Tali, seems like we have our next stop cut out for us, don't we?" Shepard nodded approvingly at her with a grim grin, having removed his helmet in respect when he declared Kahoku dead.

* * *

_Nepheron, Columbia System, 12 June, 3868_

"Our work is cut out for us then, Joker?" Shepard had advised his team to take time to sleep before the next mission, then followed his own advice, so he hadn't been able to get his squad's take on all this, but hey, that could wait, sleep was more critical to survival, or rather, to avoiding damage.

"Yes, Commander, we've located an underground facility here." Joker pointed at the planetary surface map, then zoomed it in to show the operations area. "We'll be dropping you here, sir." He highlighted a position to the northeast of the facility, "it's over the horizon so they can't see you coming in for a landing, unless they have a Soothsayer Perimeter Monitoring System, which I highly doubt, but the Rhino's fast enough to cover the distance in just over a minute"

"Good, Joker, tell Liara, Kaidan, Tali and Wrex to get ready for this op, we're going to take the Rhino down there, Joker, are there any static defences?"

"We didn't detect any on focused Omni scans, so… no, but we detected a number of bio signs so there may be a warm reception committee waiting down there for you."

"Got it, Joker, see you later." Shepard said, walking into the cargo bay from the elevator as he shut down his forearm/wrist computer's holographic interface. As usual, the crew of five clamoured into the Rhino, the cargo bay doors opened and the clamp at the back of the tank, coupled with the tank's inertial manipulators, slowly turned the tank upside down and moved it through the atmospheric containment field. The Restorer was already positioned upside-down relative to the Normandy, and quickly grabbed the tank with its magnetic/inertial grapples before pulling away. Two minutes later, it dumped the Rhino onto the surface from a height of fifty meters, the tank's internal computers keeping it right side up and reducing the impact.

"We're here, let's get moving." Shepard said as he right-clicked on the screen where he wanted the tank to go, as well as setting the guns to cyclic fire to deal with infantry more effectively.

As they approached the facility, the Rhino came under fire from anti-tank weapons, namely two Light Plasma Cannons that had been deployed by infantry and a number of Seven Hand troops wielding Infantry Nanodart Launchers. Thankfully, the damage potential was not quite as great as the vehicular versions, though the Nanodarts still did 15 damage per second per launcher to the Rhino; or rather its over-shield; two or three of the infantry were being cut down each second in return. The Light Plasma Cannons were blown apart in a few well-placed strikes, The Rhino didn't even bother firing at the snipers with their anti-materiel rifles, it just ran them over one by one, in the end of the fight, they had pushed the Rhino into the yellow zone in structural integrity, to which Shepard said "Impressive, if we had been piloting a Tier 1 vehicle or one with slower gun cycling rates, we'd probably be dead, but that's why a lot of Commanders love the Rhino" he grinned in satisfaction, patting one of the tank's bulkheads while on his way out with the rest of the team.

"What I don't get is how their armour is on par this time with Cybran Light armour in terms of defensive capability, I mean, the computer estimated them at 27 Total hit points!" Kaidan said, sweeping the first room with her LBR while Shepard and Wrex looted it.

"The Seven Hand Node still has Coalition-level technology, though even they know better than to give it to everyone else in the galaxy." Shepard replied, finishing up and moving toward the door, standing next to it and preparing to break in. "Guys, ready? Tali, how many?"

"Five near the middle of the room and three at the other end, one left, one middle, one right probably snipers, not sure what the five in the middle are but probably commandoes, maybe some heavy weapons." Tali replied, while everyone else nodded. "I have the door controls, Shepard, just give me a signal when ready"

"Liara, prep a singularity, as soon as the door opens, fire it around the corner straight down the center of the room, Garrus, you cop the sniper on the left with your LBR" the Turian extended his rifle to sniper mode with a nod "Kaidan, you lift the sniper on the right, Wrex, get out your newest toy, you'll need to help Tali pound the group of commandoes into oblivion, I'll get the sniper on the right. Liara, blast the sniper in the middle with a good burst from your SMGs, if you hit the commandoes, that's fine, but make sure he keeps his head down, once the other troops are down, we focus on him, got it everyone?"

Everyone nodded in acknowledgement. "On three, Tali… one, two, three" The door disengaged and hissed open. Even before it was open halfway (it opened to the top and bottom) a blue hand hurled a singularity around its frame into the central cluster of Seven Hand Commandoes, who were caught off-guard and yanked from behind their cover. Garrus and Shepard had launched one overcharge shot each at the two snipers in the corners, then followed up with a burst from their other weapons, Shepard's GLMG and Garrus's PSMG blasting the Snipers to oblivion, it seemed that as usual, they had lower health than the other troops, considering how fast they died.

Wrex had come up from behind the cover the opening door offered, jammed the six rotary barrels of his Gauss Chaingun through the spreading gap and fired a steady stream of rounds into the Commandoes, who were still being slowly dragged in toward the singularity; such was the speed the squad moved at. Liara and Tali were beside him, Tali having locked the doors in their half-open state to offer cover, blasting away with their own weapons, using gun cam to evade the wildly inaccurate return fire from the commandoes. Tali's Phasic Shotgun effectively ripped chunks out of the commandoes while Liara's Phasic and Laser SMGs did the same, the occasional burst that made it through the bodies was enough to keep the sniper's head down for now, well, that and Shepard's GLMG fire. Garrus had like the rest of him jammed his LBR in through the gap in the door (he was on the right side of the horizontal slit) and opened fire, relying on gun cam.

"Why won't they DIE?" Wrex asked Shepard over the din of the Gauss Chaingun

"It's just how our armour is, supremely effective! And it's testament to our vehicle weapons too, considering how few shots it takes our vehicles to get through them. They should be dying right about… now." As if on cue, the first exploding head could bee seen on everyone's gun cam as the commandoes' armour and shields finally began to fail one by one. Before Liara's eight-second singularity failed, the Seven Hand Commandoes had all been blown to small chunks and pieces of meat and metal.

"Wrex, got your Nanodart Launcher?" Shepard asked once the commandoes had fallen down dead.

"Yes, I'll do the job." Wrex said curtly "Asari, please Lift him."

"If you can't remember her name then can you at least remember that you have Biotics too?" Tali said to the Krogan next to her before Liara could respond.

"I never studied Lift; you… er… please use Lift on him, Liara, thank you." Wrex's voice raised nearly an octave when Tali shoved her flamethrower in the general region of his crotch.

"No problem." Liara stopped watching the other two's banter and casually threw a Lift at the sniper, causing him to float helplessly into the air, Wrex's Nanodart being fired and him ducking back under the cover moments before the man overcharged his LBR-1 (the older model) and the beam passed through where Wrex's head would have been. A loud boom signalled Wrex and Tali to blast the man with their shotguns, using overcharge, aka Carnage, while he was still disoriented and low on shields. Needless to say, the sniper hit the ground dead moments after the rounds hit him and sent him flying.

After thoroughly looting all the loot-able items in the facility, and ensuring no Coalition technology would be leaked by using reclamation, Tali tried to hack a console at the far end of the room on the left of the main room, an alarm popped up and the disk began flushing itself. She downloaded as much stuff as possible before the terminal finished wiping its memory and shut down.

Once they were back aboard the Normandy, Shepard received a transmission from a Shadow Broker agent, asking for the files Tali had helped find. "Admiral Kahoku promised the Shadow Broker a copy of all files found if the Shadow Broker informed him where the Seven Hand bases were."

"Oh yeah? Well the last time I met a Shadow Broker Agent he was a traitor to the Broker, how can I be sure you're not working for Saren like Fist was, huh? Forget it, mister, no way am I giving you those files."

"Be warned that the Shadow Broker will not forget this transgression the next time you need help, Commander Shepard, but he has informed me that he is willing to let this slide… for now." The agent ended the transmission, and Shepard checked his next communiqué, it was from Admiral Hackett.

* * *

_Several Days Later…_

"Shepard, someone's been killing off former Cybran scientists, who all worked on a classified project on Akuze, this may be of personal interest to you, John. The last of the scientists should be in the Newton System of the Kepler Verge, probably on Ontarom. The Coalition is planning to use experimental-class quantum impulse drives to accelerate the moon's orbit and get it into a stable orbit, thus saving the planet's biosphere, but that's a story for another day. Please investigate the scientist's labs, thank you." Hackett's transmission cut off, apparently, while they were away, Hackett had pinged, but seeing Shepard gone, had left the message.

"Another mission for us, Shepard?" Liara said, having been in the comm. room alongside Shepard because she wanted to talk to him about his experiences growing up in what was probably the only galactic superpower equal to the Citadel Council Races. She wanted to get to know the little things, such as how it felt in a Cybran classroom and such, and whether or not any Cybran had ever had a Union with an Asari, and about what would happen to the twined AI in the process of a mind-meld. She had a feeling that his twined AI was the "other" she ha sensed when she'd melded with him, but she wasn't exactly sure…

"Yes, Liara, another mission, I have a feeling you want to ask me about something, Liara."

"Do you have a moment?" Liara looked around "and can we do this in private? Like, maybe, my room?"

"Sure, why not?" Shepard said, following her into her room.

"I've been doing some research, Shepard, and taking into consideration what you said earlier about being able to ask you anything I wanted to know, I'd like to ask about the Cybran Nation."

"Well, socially we are most similar to the Quarians, but without the complete necessity of doing so. We strive to understand, for we were never understood in the past, we try to consider our enemies' points of view, and we try to achieve compromise, somewhat similar to the Asari… is there something specific you'd like to know?"

"How does AI twining affect the mind?"

"Well, it allows us to control Biotics and emotions easier, it allows us somewhat higher percentage of use of our brain computing capacity, and it protects us from such effects as indoctrination with its abundant firewalls, it allows us better memory, but it makes us somewhat vulnerable to headaches when in the presence of high EM fields, and in extreme cases will make us slightly hampered in reaction time and such if it is disabled. The Liberation Matrix was the first thing that prevented using programs to enslave us. The system cannot input information to our brains, only assist in its processing and output, but it CAN block heavy brain-wave assaults."

"Have there been any records of Cybrans and Asari joining?"

"Your species reproduces by use of mind-melding, right?"

"Yes, indeed."

"It has never been studied, but since the tuning waves of joining as you call it are benign and non-harmful in nature, the twined AI part of a Cybran's consciousness will not interfere." Shepard decided not to push; they still had the mission ahead of them.

"Thank you for your time, Shepard, I will come to you if I have further questions." Liara said, he took the cue and left her to her research.

"By the way, Liara, consider relaxing a little before we get to Ontarom."

"Thanks, Shepard, for the suggestion." She said as the door closed behind Shepard.

* * *

_Ontarom, Newton System, 19 June, 3868_

"Wrex, Tali, Liara, this would be a good chance for you to get some practice with the LBR-2 Laser Battle Rifle, it's an assault rifle which can be extended and locked into sniper configuration by this way" Shepard drew the barrel out, then clicked two of the supporting tubes to either side together, locking them into place, then pulled that part out and pushed the two support rails out and locked them together, creating a much longer weapon than before. "Now the procedure for laser weapons aiming is very simple, you take the gun, point it at an enemy, and the holographic targeting system will display your point of impact on the target. If you don't want to rely on that, say if there's jamming, you can use the optical scope, but make sure to offset your aim as it's calibrated to be parallel to the barrel, so aim a little above your target area." He handed out the three rifles from the weapons sash in the back of the Rhino.

"I prefer shotguns and assault weapons myself, kills more targets in shorter time…" Wrex grumbled.

Garrus shook his head "with a sniper rifle, you can get your enemy before he even has a chance to close to range, that's better than Assault Rifles or shotguns."

"Garrus, I never said sniper rifles were bad per se, I merely said I preferred Assault Rifles and Shotguns, you have a problem with that?" Wrex growled threateningly.

"Not really, now let's see how you do…" Garrus grinned, flaring his mandibles.

Wrex sighted up on one merc while Liara and Tali sighted up on another two. They each fired, Only Tali managed to score a clean kill, Wrex had to fire again at his target. Liara hit her target the second time, splattering most of the Turian's internal organs into the air as a cloud of vapour. Tali sighted up on a second as Wrex punched a round through a sniper's head, blowing it clean off. She got a glancing hit to the man's shoulder, but she rectified the problem a moment later when she blew the man's brains out. Liara got her second kill with a clean neck shot, blasting the Batarian's head onto the air on a pillar of steam and vaporized flesh.

Shepard looked over their handiwork approvingly, none of the merc had gotten away "Okay, guys, now you more or less know how to use an LBR in case of emergency, I know you're better with your usual weapons but it's better to be prepared just in case, now, let's go down there and see what's happening underground."

The Rhino got down the plateau in a matter of seconds, rolling up to the entrance of the facility before the crew jumped off. The first room was checked and looted before the squad prepared to break into the second room, using Tali's Omni Sensor as a guide. They took cover in the door frame and laid down fire from the cover near the entrance as soon as the door opened. The mercenaries put up a good fight, but the power of the Coalition weapons was too much for them, and one by one they succumbed, even the two Krogan. A flanking attempt on the right side was thwarted by use of Wrex's Gauss Chaingun, other than that, it was a simple fire exchange. After looting this room as well, the squad proceeded deeper into the facility until they reached a T-junction. The door to the left was locked, so they checked the one to the right.

Wrex almost bumped into Shepard when he froze up at the sight of the soldier in UEF Light Coalition Marine armour holding a gun to a scientist, then he told Liara, Garrus and Tali to wait in the main room, this was probably something personal for the Commander.

"Toombs? Is that you? I thought you died on Akuze?"

"I was kidnapped by a group of Cybran scientists, who claimed to be from the Seven Hand Node. They used me for a guinea pig to test their Thresher Maw spit, they wanted to weaponize it, and the attack on Akuze, Shepard, do you remember that?"

"How could I forget?" Shepard said softly, lowering his LBR's barrel toward the ground.

"Brackman was behind it, the whole thing! I remember this man, this 'Doctor' Wayne as he injected me with the spit of Thresher Maws, I remember the mad gleam in his eyes as he used me for a lab rat, just like all the other scientists. Shepard, you should remember, this was one of the men who stood by and did nothing while we died on Akuze, this was the man who let Brackman's monstrosity happen."

"Toombs, Doctor Brackman stated that the original transmission was to send some Mech Marines to investigate, he wanted to see what sort of defences could hold off Thresher Maws and kill them if they ever attacked a colony." The frightened scientist, Wayne, said, his teeth chattering together.

"Silence!" Toombs roared, his grip on the Phasic pistol tightening, Shepard could see the scientist's legs shaking slightly in fear "The only reason I managed to escape from your horrific lab was because someone already took down the Cybran Node responsible for you! If, and that's a big if considering Brackman's deeds in the past, what you say is true, that still didn't stop you from selling me to the Seven Hand Node! You were the man who made it possible for them to torture me for years, cutting and slicing and sampling and injecting. I was treated worse than a lab rat; at least the rats would be euthanized after an experiment. Now tell me why I shouldn't euthanize YOU!" His grip had become so tight the pistol had begun to shake, it was time for Shepard to step in.

"Toombs, I understand," Shepard slowly brought Toombs' arm down a little, looking into his old friend's eyes "don't you think I want to kill him too? But this SCUM" Shepard snarled at the scientists, who cringed in fear, then returned back to his normal voice, talking to Toombs "Killing him is far too nice, he should be put on trial, to let the galaxy witness his sins, to be shunned for the rest of his pathetic life" Shepard removed his helmet and spat on Wayne, then turned back to Toombs "by everyone he met and will meet, everyone he knows. He put you through hell, the best way to put him through hell is to put him on public trial."

Toombs had calmed down slightly, tears spilling over "all those months in their facility… being their test subject, I just wanted it to end, for the pain to stop, for the screaming to stop… This man was the one in charge, he ordered all of it, all of that… I'll listen to you, Shepard, but if they come up with some bullshit like immunity for testifying against the Seven Hand Node or try to do something to him to stop him from speaking out against Doctor Brackman's faulty orders…"

Shepard wrapped his friend in a hug "Toombs, if they try to fuck with us like that, give me a call, and I'll be right there with you when we hunt this sorry fucker or whoever tried to shut him up down, we'll see how long they last against us, alright?"

Toombs finally let the gun clatter to the ground, but was then startled by the thud of flesh impacting against metal and a scream. Shepard was calling the Coalition authorities on his forearm computer, he also looked up at the noise.

"That'll teach the dishonourable bastard, inflicting pain on someone who cannot fight back at all!" Wrex spat on Wayne, after he had broken his right leg with a kick, noticing Shepard's raised eyebrow, Wrex said "What? It's not like this man can't stand up and try to punch me!"

"You know, Toombs, we could always say the mercs roughed him up…" Shepard looked sideways at his old friend. "Just make sure you don't kill him, he had a long time to suffer yet before he dies… take off your armour for this, will ya?"

"Exactly what I was thinking…" Toombs smiled. The first swift kick he landed on the man was with a normal boot, but still straight to the balls. Wayne's scream echoed off the walls while Wrex turned his head, twiddled with his thumbs, and whistled a tune.

Garrus, Tali, and Liara, having listened in on the exchange via Tali's tech proficiency and their comm. channels, were completely not surprised that they had decided to rough Wayne up before the authorities arrived. In fact, they were wondering why they weren't using Iridium Gauss munitions on the man's limbs to fill him up with holes, while still giving him a chance to live by not shooting any major arteries or veins.

By the time the authorities had arrived, Toombs had agreed to get therapy, after doing some stress relief work, which made sure that Wayne had to be removed on a stretcher, though he would live, and would never dare tell anyone how he was beaten up, or by whom. Shepard's crew returned to the Normandy, each pensive about what had just happened. Liara was thinking _I really should not have referred to his experience on Akuze as enduring, just look at that poor man we had to save from himself_… Tali and Garrus, on the other hand, were of the opinion that Wayne deserved what he got, or maybe more of a beating.

* * *

A/N: Hope that's a decent amount of action after two boring chapters.

Just short of 13,000 words in about 1.2 days, not bad…


	17. Feros: The Geth

A/N: Just by the way, I will NOT repeat NOT cover all the side missions (rather not go blind from overstressing my eyes on the monitor)

Also, just by the way, this is my first fic (the only reason I split the prequel into another fic is because people didn't like to read about the Seraphim War and the exploits of the Elite Four i.e. Hackett, Hannah Shepard, Ariel Williams, and Seth-Thauum), more or less, so my style may be a bit rough around the edges and be a far cry from the legends that dot this website, but I'd like to think that with work, I will get better. Though I wonder how one writes a fight scene where one side has near-absolute firepower and range superiority… (After all, infantry weapons are designed to give a chance against, say, Mech Marines or Land Scouts and heavy weapons against T1 aircraft and Light Tanks)

* * *

Chapter 17: Feros – The Geth

"Commander, we have an urgent transmission from Coalition High Command, the ExoGeni corporate colony on Feros, in the Theseus System is under attack and we can't gate in any Commanders because of the quantum storms." Joker's voice blared over the intercom, causing Shepard and the rest of the squad, except Tali, to drop what they were doing and sprint to the comm. room.

"What's the situation?" Shepard asked urgently.

Admiral Hackett frowned on the screen "Shepard, Zhu's Hope, on Feros, is a very young colony, the planet has a Prothean megatropolis that covers over sixty percent of the surface, with very few seas being the only uncovered areas. The colonists have been trying to build on what the Protheans left behind, but they are under attack by Geth and are requesting assistance, you are the ship that can get there fastest."

"Estimated numbers of Geth, sir?"

"At least a raiding fleet, most likely with lots of armatures and heavier Geth soldiers, I know the Rhino outclasses them all but even an ACU can be swarmed to death by overwhelming numbers of Light Tanks, be careful. I recommend gating to the outer regions of Attican Beta and then Mass Effect FTL can take you the rest of the way, into the quantum storm brewing in the area."

"Understood, sir, should I deploy a base?"

"Not right away, investigating Saren's action is your first priority, but if there's something fishy going on with ExoGeni, start reclaiming the Prothean Ruins and building a Coalition-style city. Also, make sure there's an actual ecosystem in place that the colonists can support themselves on, I don't trust these corporate types to not give the colonists nutrient sludge to eat." Hackett nodded at Shepard after shaking his head.

"Thank you, sir, anything else I should know?"

Hackett rolled his eyes "Good luck, John." He said before ending the conversation.

"Sorry, what did I miss?" Tali said, entering the comm. room, still fixing one of the clothes that went over her enviro-suit.

"We have a new assignment, on Feros this time, and it's actually Saren's Geth, not something completely unrelated to our mission." Shepard told her.

It was Garrus that first noticed something was wrong "Tali, why are half your decorative cloths detached?"

"I took a shower, duh, and I had to hurry through the suiting up process to get here in time to just miss the transmission." Tali said, strapping one of her belts in place.

Wrex turned his head around so fast he almost strained it "You WHAT?" Garrus's jaw and mandibles were too far apart to say much, he was gaping.

"Took a shower, is that so unusual?" Tali said, looking defensive, crossing her arms over her chest and huffing in irritation.

"I think what Wrex is trying to ask how you could remove your suit, we all know Quarian immune systems were not as strong as those of some other species even before the Fleet, and now it is… well, yeah…" Liara said, realizing she had stumbled into a sensitive topic and quickly shut up.

"The Normandy had decontamination units installed in Tali's quarters, as well as an auto-lock mechanism on her door. The field on the door will, in addition to maintaining pressure in case of hull breach, also sterilize air that passes through if it is set to that, in Tali's room's case, it is." Shepard intervened before the discussion got more awkward.

* * *

_Feros, sometime in Late June, 3868_

The Normandy swung around several Prothean skyscrapers that stood above the level of the clouds, Joker was trying to raise someone on the ground, to no avail, until they finally docked in the Docking Bay of Zhu's Hope, Tali, Liara, Garrus and Ashley moving down the ramp as a unit, their weapons drawn but held at their sides, Tali was visually scanning the seedy-looking place while Shepard greeted a colonist that welcomed then and told them that the leader, Fai Dan, wanted to speak with Shepard and his crew. Liara and Ashley were also looking around and examining the colonist's expression, while Garrus was sweeping the area for snipers, just in case, using his helmet's augmented optics arrays (More accurately known as the Perimeter Monitoring System helmet upgrade).

Several Geth Pulse Rifle rounds tore through the man's body almost as soon as he'd finished talking. The squad, once they saw that it was only one Geth Trooper, didn't bother taking cover, simply cutting it down in a shower of sparks. Then a squad of Geth spilled into the hall, Liara and Tali each took out a Geth Rocket Trooper, one by shotgun, one by slamming it into the ceiling hard enough with Biotics, before the last one's Disruption Rocket forced them to dive behind cover. The Shock Troopers and standard troopers suppressed the group with a continuous stream of fire as they advanced toward the group's positions.

"If they get to melee range, we're at a disadvantage; they have mostly shotgun-type weapons, and Geth are pretty strong physically." Garrus said.

"I know, engaging Tactical Cloak now." Shepard became completely invisible. Not even a distortion in the air existed to show where he was. However, on the HUD overlay, there was a purple ball of energy that signalled where Shepard's cloak emitter was, even though the naked eye or optic sensors could see absolutely nothing.

Garrus watched said purple ball of energy as it slipped between the advancing Geth Shock Troopers and Troopers, outflanking the lone Rocket Trooper before firing a double-tap into its head with the distinctive laser bolt pattern of an LBR. An LSMG would have fired one bolt from the top barrel, then one from the bottom, then another from the top, etc. while a pistol would have been less rapid-fire. Some of the other Geth turned around, and, seeing absolutely nothing that could have killed their compatriot, became wary, this did not stop, however, Shepard from gaining a superior position and spraying Gauss LMG rounds at them. They had no clue where the rounds came from, as Coalition Gauss munitions were fairly quiet and had very small muzzle flashes relative to their power. With the Geth thus distracted, Tali's Sabotage and Overload killed several of the Shock Trooper while Liara managed to fire off a Singularity. Most of the remaining Geth were flung into the air and crashed into each other and other miscellaneous object i.e. filing cabinets, their own rifles, Geth parts, etc. while spinning around the singularity. The team made short work of the two Shock Troopers still on the ground before methodically cutting the Geth caught in the mass effect field to pieces.

"Alright, men, let's head up the stairs, watch out for Hoppers, I have a feeling we might run into some…" his GLMG and LSMG roared to life as the first Hoppers came into view, Liara throwing singularities to keep the Geth off-balance as the crew fought the uphill, or rather, upstairs battle. The Hoppers tried to use Assassination quite a few times, but the dim red targeting lasers, highlighted by the team's HUDs, only made the Hoppers bigger and higher priority targets, of the attempts that did hit, nothing got through the over-shields of the squad members. Tali was starting to wonder what would happen if she went toe-to-toe with a Geth Destroyer or Juggernaut in their armour without bothering with cover. She suspected that she would come out on top, even with her Aeon LIGHT Armour, though her choice of heavy weapon may have something to do with it.

Still, she chose not to use her heavy weapon on the staircase, simply because though it was an enclosed space, it was also relatively fragile. Intense thermal discharges could permanently damage it and destabilize the structure, causing them to all fall to their deaths. She had just gotten herself the White Phosphorus upgrade for it, so it was even less safe to use the weapon here.

The group stalked past a defensive barricade where two colonists were arguing about who would be going to scout for Geth. Everyone rolled their eyes almost in unison, as they went through what looked suspiciously like a downed freighter disguised as a building and located Fai Dan.

"About time you got here… they only sent five people? I knew things were bad with the Coalition and ExoGeni's relationship but apparently they haven't realized that down here, it's the goddamned apocalypse!" the olive-skinned woman yelled, waving her arms in the air for emphasis. "We've got Geth swarming all over the colony and ragged pockets of barely organized resistance by our colonists, command channels are off-line and our main strategic coordination system was taken out by a Geth bomb not ten minutes into the fight." She calmed down somewhat after the exaggerated make-a-point type motion.

"Arcelia! Don't be so rude!" the man said before extending his hand "Hello, I am Fai Dan, the local administrator of Zhu's Hope; it is good to see reinforcements arriving, sirs and madams." He inclined his head toward Shepard's crew while shaking Shepard's hand, before a sudden rumbling cut the conversation off.

"More Geth are in the tower, probably dropped from the roof!" Arcelia supplied, slightly before Shepard's squad noticed the increase in hostile/unknown red contacts on their networked omni sensors.

"We'll deal with them." Shepard said, nodding to the two colonist leaders. A number of Geth burst into the room and laid down a field of fire at Shepard's squad, Liara used Throw on the closest Shock Trooper and sent it into the path of a Rocket Trooper's Disruptor Rocket. The resulting explosion took out the small squad of Rocket Troopers and left Shepard and co free to deal with the Shock Troopers. Needless to say, this did not take long due to the armour and firepower superiority the team enjoyed.

"Tali, take point, I'll cover you" Shepard said, gesturing toward the stairs with his LSMG and Laser Pistol. She nodded and made her way toward the staircase, it was a tactically sound decision considering she was the only one with a shotgun in the squad at the moment, Wrex being left on the Normandy.

Seven Phasic shotgun blasts later, they'd reached the top of the staircase, leaving the remains of six hoppers (Tali nailed one in the shoulder by accident, so she had to shoot again) in their wake. A colonist was screaming in the distance that they were being chased by Geth. A rapid volley of pulse rifle discharges cut off the voice at its source, as the group collectively crested the staircase and opened up on the small horde of Geth Rocket Troopers and Troopers that they almost came face-to-face with. Tali's whit phosphorus upgrade, much to her pleasure, allowed her to burn through the body armour of the Geth much faster and set them all a-blazing while Shepard's Temporal Fizz Launcher scattered their flaming remains over the room. Liara's Singularity helped make sure they didn't get much time behind cover, and Ashley's GLMG took care of the Geth Recon Drones that flitted about the room.

After the Geth parts stopped burning—it wouldn't do any good to save the colony from the Geth only to start a major fire—the squad advanced through the door at the far end of the room and turned left, and up to the next floor. Due to the minimal cover on the roof, Garrus and Shepard stayed in the open as they shoved the three very irritated females behind what meagre cover there was. Ashley's comment was an indignant "Stop waving your dick around Shepard! I know you're not that big!" Indeed, she'd walked in on him in the communal showers at training, before the idiots in charge of Marine Training decided to replace the facilities with similar comforts as that of commanders, or on shipboard life.

Shepard's cover consisted of his cloak, which didn't even ripple as he was hit by an occasional lucky shot by the hostiles, thus protecting him. Garrus went the more direct way, deploying the UEF Heavy Armour's Entrench ability, which made his movements much slower but supercharged his shields and fields. Garrus naturally attracted most of the fire even as he fired back with Phasic SMG and LBR, blowing one trooper to bits with each pair of shots. The Rocket Troopers, having reloaded, refocused their aim on Garrus, who paled as the absurdly slow disruptor rockets began moving, if he left Entrench the Geth could probably get him while his shields were down from the splash damage, if he stayed… direct Disruptor Rocket hits were not healthy.

"GARRUS, HUNKER!"Shepard shouted over the comm. at his friend, who finally hit the activation switch just in time.

A tight sphere of energy formed around Garrus while mass, channelled from the Normandy formed a secondary shell around the Turian's armour. The disruption rockets, four of them (one being shot down in flight by Shepard's LSMG), slammed into the new armoured shell and stripped away the armour in a small zone, doing very little to the over-shield beneath. The armour was quickly mended over (though it was thinner overall) by the structural field re-engaging after being overloaded.

The Rocket Troopers were first to go once they pulled that stunt, blasted to shreds by Nanodarts (courtesy of Ashley), Gauss munitions, Phasic rounds, and laser bolts. Garrus went back to Entrench, the mass flowing back to the Normandy through the Hunker Module's quantum uplink system (his armour could not channel much mass at a time, so the Hunker Module was required for the ability). He helped take down the remaining Geth Troopers along with the rest of the squad before they began seeking better positions on the roof, their radar (or rather Tali's considering her radar and Omni were both upgraded by her helmet upgrade) showing an approaching air unit. The Geth Dropship flew over the rooftop and dropped a dozen Troopers, six Shock Troopers, a Rocket Trooper, two Destroyers and a Juggernaut. The five had spread out around the rooftop and now began firing on the Geth from all sides.

The Juggernaut was first to go down, taking several Phasic pulses, a lot of Gauss rounds, over a dozen laser bolts, and finally an Infantry Plasma Cannon blast before finally blowing itself to pieces (the Infantry Plasma Cannon Shepard deployed may or may not have been overkill). Then Shepard spoke an order that changed the firing priorities "Use Cull Weakest Fire Mode, Liara, disable the stronger ones with Singularity, Tali, Sabotage and/or Overload any she misses."

"Got it, Shepard." Liara threw a pair of Singularities out, one toward each Destroyer, each Singularity picked up two Shock Troopers. She huffed a little as she brought the two gravity wells closer together, it took a lot of control, but she managed to make the Geth spin in opposite directions and continually smash into each other, and the Destroyers that were struggling to hold onto the ground. Shields and Barriers were ignored as the Geth began moving faster and smashing pieces off one another. In the meantime, Shepard and Ashley had methodically used their heavy weapons to eliminate the Troopers, using the splash and explosions to their advantage to clump Geth together and eliminate them. Tali had, with some work, prevented the Rocket Trooper, Destroyers, or Shock Troopers from getting shots off with Overload pulses (Rocket Trooper) and Sabotage (Destroyers). The Shock Troopers only required her to hack one for them to target the nearest hostile, namely, the one unfriendly Geth in the area.

Garrus was picking off threats as they appeared, having just put one through a Destroyer, he noticed the Dropship preparing to drop more Geth. "Oh no you don't!" He took aim and sniped one of the hydraulic lines with an overcharged laser bolt. Surprisingly, the Dropship had its shields down, apparently to facilitate dropping troops, the net result was the drop bay door stuck more or less closed. The Dropship engaged its shields after that as it sat there, trying to auto-repair.

After the last Geth went flying over the edge of the roof (courtesy of a Lift and Throw from Liara), the Dropship's doors had finally auto-repaired and began to (much slower than before) open again. Shepard, Ashley, Garrus, Tali and Liara had different ideas. "Tali use your Shield Disruptor!" Shepard called, preparing his Temporal Fizz Launcher "Liara, man this gun!" He exchanged cover with her as Liara scrambled over and grabbed onto the large heavy weapon, which was set up on an extendable tower, with a large shield protecting the user somewhat.

"I don't have a Shield Disruptor!" Tali said, firing her Phasic Shotgun at the Dropship to no avail, its shield was just too strong.

"You've got a Shield Attenuator Right Arm, Improved Interface Left Hand, Improved Recharge Right Hand, that allows you to activate the Shield Disruption ability, hold your right forearm and aim the small barrel that you see on the back" There was a pair of small barrels set into a graceful alcove in the armour, both pointing forward. "And when you're ready, send the command through your right hand's holo-console." Tali did as she was told and blinked behind her helmet as the lower barrel of her right arm glowed slightly before releasing a pulse of energy. The Dropship's first layer of shielding blinked off with the impact, and the second layer rippled.

"Wow, that's pretty powerful, Shepard…" Tali said, it usually took a frigate shell or two to get through the first, weakest layer of shielding.

"It's only really good against shields; on Coalition Shields that would register as 400 points, though the Absolver T3 Shield Disruptor can deal up to 2400 in one pulse, otherwise, the pulse does almost nothing." Shepard said, opening up with his Temporal Fizz Launcher.

* * *

Liara would have had nearly no clue what to do without her helmet HUD displaying the necessary instructions. It was fairly simple, take the two handlebars at the back of the gun, point it at the target by moving yourself around the weapon, and depress the firing studs to fire. Non-lethal munitions could be activated via a switch hidden in a covered alcove on the bottom of the gun. She didn't bother with that.

As soon as Tali's Shield Disruptor Pulse hit the Dropship and stripped away a full layer of shielding in one shot, she opened up on the Dropship from her position, thankful that the Dropship's guns were all either dorsal, to the front, or along the sides, so it had a hard time reaching them, because they were under it. After the group gave it a pounding that came close to draining its shields and reaching the hull, it flew away, giving up the idea of dropping more troops. It was coming back for another run, this time bombardment—Shepard and company were scrambling down the stairs to better cover, when its path was intersected by Zealot SIM Missiles.

Missiles powerful enough to blast a 100-ton Interceptor to vapour in a single hit (A/N: Interceptors have at most 295 HP, their wrecks less, a single Zealot Missile from a Transcender SAM installation does 600, enough to leave no wreck whatsoever) smashed into the Geth Dropship. A shadow fell over the smaller vessel (the Dropship being only around 80m long) as the Normandy approached, having cleared the air elsewhere, mopped up all available ground targets, and responded to the detection of an airborne threat. The Geth ship tried to accelerate and run, but much to the horror of its many processes, the Coalition Corvette easily overtook it, the menacing weapon under its nose elevating downward to point squarely at the Dropship, which fired back with every weapon at its disposal, the pulses intercepted harmlessly by the larger ship's shields as it seemed to contemplate the wasp-like ship for a moment.

Shepard and crew, having patched into the Normandy's strategic display feed, watched as the wasp was swatted. The dual quantum cannons on each wingtip and the under nose dual proton cannon opened up as one, while the Zealot SIM Launchers of the wings cycled and fired again.

Suffice it to say that while Geth Dropships were by no means weak nor lightly armoured, they were NOT meant to engage ships with weapons that matched up to those of cruisers. The wasp-like Geth ship resembled an exploding hive by the time it finally hit the ground far below, such was the amount of internal damage done by the Normandy's guns. Dual Proton Cannons had torn its guts to ribbons with their one-second cycling rate, while the Dual Quantum Cannons fired every four seconds and the Zealot Missiles every two.

"Well, maybe we should go back to Fai Dan and tell him the tower's clear now, Shepard, instead of looking for loot." Ashley said, tapping Shepard on the shoulder while he rummaged around the rooftop storage containers looking for interesting data or artefacts.

"Fine… let's go talk to the old man." Shepard sulked, he had found nothing interesting… yet.

* * *

"So you're saying that in addition to the Geth in the Tunnels, you guys have a power, water and food shortage?" Shepard asked incredulously, wondering what the hell ExoGeni had been doing for its colonists.

"Well, yes…" Fai Dan trailed off. "You can talk to Macha Doyle, Davin Reynolds and May O'Connell about the problems they're in charge of, sorry, I gotta go." He said as his comm. pinged urgently for his attention.

"No problem, Fai Dan, we'll deal with it." Shepard held up a hand and shook Fai Dan's before the team turned and walked past the elevator and down the stairs, encountering only a shot colonist and two Hoppers on the way down the many levels of stairs. They entered the tunnels without much incident, except for the odd roadblock, but there, they found some more Geth. A pair of Destroyers, some Shock Troopers, and a Sniper.

Garrus counter-sniped the Sniper while Liara's Warp knocked down the Destroyers, Tali's Overload pulses cracking down on the shields of the Shock Troopers, while Ashley and Shepard tore into them with their Gauss Light Machine Guns, the other three joining them after doing their stuff. The Geth went down fairly fast, after which the crew headed down the right tunnel, where Geth Signatures were detected. The two Geth Snipers on an upper balcony in the tall cavern they came to proved little trouble once Shepard, Ashley and Garrus went sniper LBR, but once they traversed the current section of the chamber and found themselves in the next, they met a minor issue, three Krogan. Though Coalition Marine Armours were strong, close range combat with Krogan could still inflict some internal injuries from blunt trauma, so the crew back-pedalled into the first room while firing and taking fire, three Carnage shots taking out Ashley's weakened shields (she had taken two Geth Sniper rounds from the snipers) and scorching her armour slightly before they managed to take down the first Krogan. Ashley ducked behind cover as the remaining two began focusing on her, while she waited for her shields to recharge; she fired over her crates via gun cam. Fortunately for her, the other two Krogan went down before they could reach her cover, even despite their regeneration, the last mainly thanks to an overcharged blast from a certain Quarian Machinist's Phasic Shotgun when he had come close.

* * *

"You gotta wonder what the hell ExoGeni's problem is, eh, guys?" Shepard said, finally walking up to the elevator to the skyway, where they would head for the ExoGeni headquarters.

"Yeah, this standard in the Fleet would have the whole senior crew of the ship in question demoted to bottom-level crewmen and be shipped from ship to ship doing plumbing in the latrines." Tali quipped, looking around in disgust.

"And to quote what you told me last week, 'with over ten thousand ships, the Migrant Fleet has a lot of latrines', right Tali?" Ashley said playfully, waiting for the elevator to move them to the skyway.

"That's the whole point of the exercise, they're not sentenced to clean all the fleet's latrines, usually only to clean for a certain amount of time, say around a year." Tali said, shrugging.

"That sounds like a very… memorable form of punishment, better than the ones C-Sec gave out." Garrus said, while looking over at Liara and Shepard, each lost in their own little world "Thirty credits say those two over there are thinking about each other."

"Not betting, it's a rigged contest." Ashley said, looking over at the Soldier and the Scientist, each lost in their own thoughts.

"Oh come on… please? Tali, how about you, want to bet?" Garrus looked at the Quarian.

"No."

"Please?"

"No"

"Please Please?"

"I have a flamethrower…"

* * *

"The one downside of having a frigate ready to fly support for us… extreme boredom." Garrus said, leaning against a bulkhead as the Restorer flew over the skyway. The gunship had strafed the Geth ahead thoroughly before landing and opening the bottom deck airlock for the five-sentient crew, who collectively stepped inside.

"True that, but it also has its upsides, such as speed." Shepard replied, shrugging. Indeed, the craft moved at around 400 meters per second even without upgrades, far faster than the Rhino ever could have hoped to move. They got to their destination, the way station, in under half a minute, jumping off before letting the Restorer go about its business.

"So where do we go now, Shepard?" Tali asked, tapping one three-toed foot while looking up at the buildings through two layers of visors, her armour having been scaled and measured to fit outside her enviro-suit, as a precautionary measure.

"Shepard?" Liara asked, nudging him with a shoulder pauldron.

"I just got a number of transmissions, the last one said whoever's transmitting could hear a vehicle and it's clearly not the Geth, I think it's probably refugees somewhere around here… let's take that down."

"That? That's a platform…" Liara said, pointing in the direction Shepard had looked at.

"I think he's talking about the stairs right next to the platform, Liara." Garrus said, causing Liara to blush slightly.

"Sorry"

"No need, Liara, now let's move it boys." Shepard began to run for the stairs when he felt something tap him on the shoulder. Ashley raised an eyebrow at him on her helmet, looking at him while the whole crew ran.

"…Right, boys and girls." Tap, tap, it was Garrus this time. "Fine, fellow sentients, better?"

* * *

"Does anyone else want to shoot that Jeong scum?"

"I would gladly park the Rhino on top of that bosh'tet if you asked me to." Tali said, her teeth almost grinding together at the utter inconsideration the man had shown to his own people.

"I don't like the guy either, something seemed… weird about him." Liara paused "Actually, something seemed off about all the colonists back at Zhu's Hope too."

"I'm starting to consider using my talons to show him some stuff at close range, say, his own organs." Garrus said, carefully examining his armoured gloves that hid his talons, ticking his fingers against one another.

"I'm considering introducing him to a neighbourhood friendly thresher maw." Wrex growled over the comm as the team pilled into the Restorer again, among piles of Geth scrap from the gunship clearing its LZ.

"Wrex… no, just no." Ashley said after staring at Wrex's face, displayed on the inside of her helmet, for a few moments.

"I think Wrex should stop spending so much time watching remakes of old Earth movies" Shepard said after a moment.

* * *

"Well, crew, we've gotten to ExoGeni's headquarters, the Restorer won't fit in the halls." The squad walked out of the gunship's airlock, which cycled closed behind them. "Careful in the garage, guys, there's probably Hoppers." Shepard raised his GLMG and advanced with caution.

And so there were Hoppers, over a dozen trying to jump around, snipe and/or melee the team, in addition to about a dozen Troopers and three Rocket Troopers coming down from the upper levels. Considering it was a ratio of less than eight to one, and the squad was equipped with shields and armour akin to that of vehicles … Let's just say that Garrus and Liara found Phasic rounds astonishingly efficient against the Hoppers, two hits being all it took to take one down (they were using SMGs, one would render the machine incapacitated and a second would tear it to ribbons). Shepard was having a field day using the GLMG's explosive munitions to rend Hoppers apart; Wrex was ripping through them with power armour and Sonic Pulse Shotgun, while Tali blazed a trail through the Geth.

She literally left a trail of burning and melting parts behind her as she unleashed torrents of white phosphorus flames upon the Geth. The Rocket Troopers could not fire on her with rockets for she was among too many of their compatriots, and were melted into scrap before they could realize their disruptor rockets were the only chance of stopping her in time.

Shortly after the last Geth went down and the flames died down, the group moved up the garage ramp only to encounter an energy barrier that their weapons failed to penetrate, though the failure to penetrate was mostly because of the rapid recharge of the barrier even against their heaviest weapons. It only took twenty seconds of trying before Shepard gave up and led them through a door opposite the barrier. Tali quickly hacked into it and opened it; the deactivated Armature inside the large chamber activated and opened fire on them. Tali rolled behind a crate as the rest of the squad scattered, Liara, being last into the chamber, caught the blast at an angle and was thrown into the wall near the door, her shield flickering slowly, the over-shield having been overwhelmed and the shield having taken heavy damage.

She didn't move from where she had fallen, slumped against the wall. The others were firing and using their abilities on the Armature to no avail, as its shields still stayed up, though flickering, while it charged its next pulse, its head pointed at Liara's fallen form.

Shepard took the blast to his over-shield and shields without much trouble, as he knew he probably could not move Liara out of the way fast enough for the sentient machine to miss, and he fired back with his Temporal Fizz Launcher as Tali's shield disruptor pulse slammed home, followed by a sabotage field that made the Armature's weapon inoperable. The heavy weapons "finally" punched through the machine, after firing on it for a little less than two seconds. The walker disintegrated into a pile of blazing parts as Shepard whirled around and activated Liara's suit's internal medical scanners. He sighed in relief as he noted that she was just knocked out, he removed her helmet to check for head injuries, as the scanners had not been adapted to Asari physiology. He was cursing himself for not asking her to update her suit's medical scanners, and thanking whatever higher powers there were that Asari were identical to humans in every aspect except the head crests, when she woke up. He was examining her head crest, having removed his helmet to help with observing details with the naked eye, when she woke up and shook her head dazedly, looking up at him.

"How do you feel, Liara?" He asked, frowning concernedly.

"Alright, I guess." She said, still watching his eyes, which were an interesting shade of brown… before she picked herself up off the floor with Shepard's help and followed him over to where Garrus, Ashley and Tali were conversing about the weirdness of the colony.

"Glad to see you're back, Liara" Ashley said, patting her on the shoulder pauldron "I think you should put your helmet back on, never know when it'll save your ass, or what you might need the HUD for."

"You're right, Chief" She did as she was told, Shepard doing likewise, before the group found a gap in the wall where they could drop down into another room. As soon as they'd all dropped down a shot rang out and a round from a Citadel pistol bounced off of Shepard's shields. Liara's biotics were up in an instant, flaring to form a barrier between Shepard and the apparent incoming direction of the rounds while a Warp charged itself in her right hand, her left grabbing the Laser SMG off her belt where it was clipped and levelling it. A growl came from her lips before she herself realized what she was doing.

Shepard also had his Laser Battle rifle pointed in the direction, thinking about the growl he'd heard earlier: _Why would Liara growl, summon up a barrier, and immediately settle into a defensive combat stance when I didn't even get hurt? Unless… no Shepard, don't go there, we're on a mission to save the Galaxy, there is no time for this sort of thing._ Satisfied, at least sort of, which his conclusion, he turned his full attention back to the attention at hand as a human came into view, apologizing profusely for thinking they were the Geth.

"Don't worry, no harm, no foul, what are you doing here? Who are you?"

"I'm Lizbeth Baynham, one of the researchers working for ExoGeni. I was trying to retrieve some data files when this whole place got locked down on me. I haven't been able to get out yet because of the Geth…"

"What are Geth doing on Feros?"

"They're probably here for the Thorian… I think"

"What or who is the Thorian?"

"Well, I don't know much, I'm just a technician…" She shrugged "I was looking to recover some files… maybe you could help? The data cache is in the interior of the facility and here's my pass card." She handed the card to Shepard "I've been hearing noises form that direction, haven't dared investigate because… well, you can see." She held out her pistol helplessly, rummaging through her lab coat's pockets and coming up with nothing else.

"I get it, you don't have enough firepower, right… go back that way" Shepard pointed over his shoulder at the ladder leading up to the main rooms "and get your ass above ground, our Restorer will cover you and pick you up if things get too heated."

Lizbeth's eyes widened "you brought a Restorer? That's… wonderful." She ran past them and was up the ladder before Shepard blinked, as the wind ruffled Tali's decorative cloths that she put around her neck.

"That… was one fast technician."

One collective facepalm later, the squad's threat detectors began to light up in red, as confirmed visuals were achieved on a group of varren, formerly painted on the HUD radars in the yellow of neutral/unknown targets. "Mow 'em down, guys, Tali, you take lead, let's save some for Wrex." The big Krogan had been observed on more than one occasion by Shepard eating varren meat in roasted form, both on the Citadel and off, so this would be a nice gift.

"No problem… The earth will burn!" Tali had put away her Phasic shotgun and pulled out her flamethrower, thumbing the white phosphorus upgrade to the off position before laying down a full 180 degree arc of fire, hosing the flamethrower back and forth, while the rest of the squad dealt with the other varren coming up from the other side, and picked off any that survived the hell Tali was unleashing. Phasic and Gauss munitions were extremely effective against unarmoured targets, while lasers tended to have a lower rate of fire and not be quite as effective at either blasting (Phasic) or penetration (Gauss), and thus were not used in the brief fight that ensued.

"Wrex is gonna enjoy the snack." Garrus said as they packed up the finely fire-roasted varren from Tali's side and beamed them up to the Normandy. "Hmm… smells like that Kentucky Fried Varren stuff Wrex liked on the Citadel… maybe you guys should try some…"

Liara made a face "Sorry, Garrus, I prefer to eat things that haven't tried to eat me, especially if they'd tried less than two minutes ago." She paused for a moment "No offence to your flamethrower skills, but I don't like actual fire-cooked meat much… just the smoky flavour… yeah."

"I've never tried to eat food cooked in an actual fire before but I'll take your word for it." Tali shrugged.

"Fire-cooked food is… okay I guess, but I don't like the taste of varren, period." Ashley chimed in.

"Now that we're done talking about culinary delights, can we move on?" Shepard asked, having grown irritated at following the conversation like a tennis match.

On their way up the stairs, they heard the noises of an irritated Krogan and a VI responding, as soon as Shepard poked his head above the landing though, the VI detected him "Excuse me, but there is a line forming behind you." Shepard made a mental note to dismantle the VI later for being an ass about revealing him.

The Krogan in question seemed to have better armour than the others, and a better gun too, because when it fired three plasma pulses splattered across Shepard's over-shield, followed by a carnage shot and a quick melee. A blast from Tali's shotgun took out the shields and Liara fired off an overcharged Throw that sent the Krogan stumbling back, before roaring and rushing forward for a melee, which Shepard parried, Garrus taking the time to fire several laser bolts into the Krogan's face. Ashley finished the fight with a short volley from her GLMG, alongside Shepard's LSMG work, though the Krogan had gotten off another Carnage blast and dropped Shepard's over-shield. It would take about four seconds to recharge once down, when still up, it recharged at half that rate, one point per second.

"Hello, may I remind you that discharging weapons on company property is forbidden?" The VI's voice rang out again, further irking Shepard.

* * *

One apoplectic Shepard led the group, chatting about the activities of ExoGeni, across a catwalk, noticing two Geth Shock Troopers bent down in prayer to a glowing orb. "Shh, it's a place of worship, weapons discharges and loud noises are forbidden!" He said dramatically, winking his helmet light in conjunction with his eye (the internal cameras could detect facial expressions and express them with the lights on the helmet).

"The Geth are probably imitating what we Quarians did before the Uprising…" Tali commented.

"Yeah, well… it's a place of worship, but a Geth place of worship…" Shepard levelled his LBR at the back of one trooper's head. "Go." A flurry of laser bolts, Phasic pulses, and gauss munitions shredded the two synthetics before they could get up and return fire. "Well, that was easy…"

"You don't say… though the mere fact that the Geth evolved pseudo-religious behaviour means they've come further than we thought…" Tali seemed to be troubled by something, Shepard couldn't quite tell what but knew that if it was something of importance to the mission or herself, she would tell him. Shrugging, he turned his attention away from his team, who were talking about the orb, and started looting the room, again.

"Onto the main entrance hall, guys, we can talk about this religious thing later." He'd finished looting and was now anxious to finish off the Geth and expose ExoGeni for their crimes against humanity; he activated the comm. link to the Normandy and asked Kaidan to immediately deploy the SCU, switch on Osmium Mass Storage, and to start reclaiming a clearing in the ruins west of the Skyway Way Station.

"Got it, Commander, what tier should I take things to?"

"Make sure you hit Tier 3, but don't bother deploying too many units, and remember to reclaim the ruins for mass, don't bother with extractors until you have a clearing at least a few kilometres on each side or have enough to build a terraformer to start re-forming this planet to a properly habitable one."

* * *

"Understood, Commander. Joker, prepare for drop."

"Yes, Kaidan, where do you want it?"

Kaidan looked at the strategic view for a place where the Prothean skyscrapers were not so thick and the ground was visible, he found a clearing close enough to Shepard's specification to work. "Here." He clicked on a high-rise near the clearing; it was the closest Joker would be able to get the Normandy, as the Restorer could not carry command units.

"Got it, coming in for drop… now." Kaidan felt a gentle shudder as the transport clamps disengaged and another shudder as the SCU landed on the top of the skyscraper. His reclamation arm did the rest of the work, reclaiming the building floor by floor from under him, nanolathing osmium blocks in mid-air to store the mass (and transport it to ground level in an easily reclaimable format) once his own, now upgraded, mass storage capacity became strained.

Kaidan walked out of the foundation area of the skyscraper he'd landed on without incident, immediately starting work on a T1 Land Factory and queuing in a T1 Engineer. He then started work on a T2 Power Plant, having the engineer reclaim the pile of osmium blocks he'd made for mass while he worked. After it was done he started on a T3 Power Plant, taking several more T1 engineers to work on deconstruction of the skyscrapers for mass while upgrading the Land Factory to T2. Tier 3 was soon reached as the Engineers fed in a constant flow of mass and his power generators fed him the energy he needed for a T3 base to be put up.

* * *

"Well, I don't think Wrex would like THIS, eh, Garrus?" Shepard said, prodding the one toasted Krogan, courtesy of Tali, with an armoured boot.

"True that, Shepard, true that, but come on, let's investigate the other rooms." Garrus motioned toward the door with his LBR, Shepard shook his head.

"Liara and Tali are still checking the terminal for anything useful."

"Shepard!" Liara called the group over "ExoGeni has sent a shipment of samples to a planet in the Vostok System of the Maroon Sea cluster, knowing them…" She trailed off.

"I understand, we'll head there sometime soon, right after this mission, probably." Shepard nodded.

"There is no other useful data on this terminal, unless you like Asari porn." Tali said, shaking her head slowly.

"Uh, no… let's go." Shepard deflected the awkward moment by heading out to the main room and going up the stairs, through a corridor, and into the midst of another small group of Geth. "Wrex would love this, so many targets…" He cut down another Trooper with a burst of GLMG fire.

"True, I'm almost wishing we'd brought him…" Garrus's mandibles twitched as he took out a Trooper himself with a sniper round from his LBR.

"Hey, you realize I have to get some action SOMETIME…" Ashley commented, causally mowing down the hopper.

Liara was using her Biotics to pull the enemy together, namely, singularity, with Warp to destabilize their armour, along with a lot of laser bolts. Tali's contributions included Overload, Sabotage, and a crapload of Phasic Shotgun pulses. The other three pitched in once they finished the stragglers, and cut the helpless Geth apart.

Once they were finished and had started searching the room for goodies to sell at the Citadel for credits, Tali noticed a console. "Shepard, we have something over here!" While the Spectre was on his way, she hacked into the computer "We've got an ExoGeni doctor's personal logs; he's concerned about providing samples to…" She froze up and called for the rest of the squad before continuing "The Seven Hand Node," she whispered, as if to herself, remembering their past experiences with the Seven Hand, then began reading very fast "the samples were sent to Chasca in the Matano System in the Maroon Sea. WE should go there sometime, Shepard."

"Alright, I'm recording this one as Investigate Samples in my journal… ExoGeni's just full of surprises, aren't they? Took in scared UEF citizens that didn't want to live near Seraphim Republic space, using them for experiments… they've got to be stopped."

"Agreed, Shepard, let's finish this mess up quickly and get going" Liara said.

"Yes, let's, I'm sick of this company."

One stairwell up and one face-to-face with a Geth Dropship anchorage claw later, the crew bumped into their next group of Geth. "They've got one Destroyer, four Shock Troopers, eight Troopers, two Rocket Troopers, no reinforcements, Shepard." Tali reported, consulting her Omni and reporting her findings.

"Good, let's get rid of them and figure out how to dispose of this claw." Shepard said from behind another crate, where he'd taken cover "Cull weakest! Cull weakest fire pattern! On my signal, Ashley, distract them for a moment, Liara, nail the Rocket Troopers with a singularity, and get as many Troopers as you can. Tali use Overload on as many of the Shock Troopers as you can, hack the Destroyer! Garrus, snipe the Shock Troopers if their shields fall! I'll provide support where needed"

"Will do!" The chorus came over the comm. as Liara tuned her mass effect fields and gripped her Phasic SMG, Tali prepared her algorithms and Garrus extended his LBR, hooking his PSMG onto his belt clip for easy access. Ashley gripped her GLMG and prepared to dive out from behind her cover as rounds flew by the five.

"Go!" They leapt into action, Ashley rolling out from behind her cover and laying down fire that took down two Geth Troopers before they could accurately track her, when she dove behind another piece of cover. By that time, three more Troopers, two Rocket Troopers, and a Shock Trooper were busy bashing each other to bits in the gravity field of a singularity, their armour being pelted by Phasic round after Phasic round (and Laser bolts from Shepard and Garrus). The other three Shock Troopers were fighting the Destroyer, whose armour was affected by a powerful Warp field Liara had put out, causing it to fall about the same time as the second Shock Trooper did. The last was taken out with a clean headshot from Garrus, who'd turned his attention away from the Singularity for long enough to do so.

The last Geth parts clattered to the floor in near-silence. "Now, what do we do about that anchor claw?" Shepard asked slowly.

Ashley looked around "hey, look, it's a shuttlebay door… let's see if it'll work…"

"I doubt it…"

* * *

Kaidan had built a Coalition-standard (Tertiary) city with military base attached to the east side, using mass entirely from the Prothean skyscrapers. He'd cleared the Prothean ruins for over fifty kilometres in each direction except east, giving the population plenty of space to build greenhouses and facilities. He'd also taken advantage of the mass around him to start setting up two Mavors for anti-orbital duty, a Salvation, and two Paragons. Now, with a small army of T3 units prepped and ready, along with a number of Civilian Trucks, all he had to do was wait for Shepard's signal.

* * *

"That actually worked… amazing." Shepard said, blinking. The Dropship had almost fallen off the tower, but it had gotten its propulsion online just in time to rise shakily above the skyscrapers… and promptly get engaged by the Restorer. The Dropship, already shield-less, didn't really stand much of a chance, it could probably have won if it had shields, but it didn't, not now.

"Sir, we have a problem…"

* * *

A/N: a Command & Conquer: Generals reference (the only half-decent C&C game by EA, they completely ripped Tiberium Wars, Tiberian Twilight, and Red Alert 3 to bits) was included, can you spot it?

Sorry for being so slow.

Reviews Welcome.


	18. The Fall Of ExoGeni

A/N: I KNOW Tiberium Wars and RA 3 are better than Tiberian Twilight… however did you know that Westwood planned for Command & Conquer 3 to have the Forgotten as a separate faction complete with powers and units? And they planned for there to still be Tiberium creatures like in Tiberian Sun? The Forgotten were supposed to be able to tame and use such creatures. Instead we now only have Visceroids and none of the wolf-like creatures from Tiberian Sun, or anything else that makes Tiberium really special. The Tiberium glaciers don't even move!

In other words, that meant EA ripped C&C 3: Tiberium Wars to bits, similar for RA 3, though I must admit they look like Gods compared to Tiberian Twilight *shudder*

Also, I know I overuse quantum storms a bit, but they did result from the instability from the firing of Black Sun clashing with the instability caused by sealing the Rift. In other words, the storms only started AFTER the Seraphim War's climax, Operation: Overlord (my version, it's in the prequel fic you can find on my profile). Showing off Shepard by having him save a colony? That's beyond what Brackman's occasional bout of stupidity is capable of. Now investigating shipments and facilities is easy, you're the ship that can get there fastest and/or is not currently on patrol, but a colony?

* * *

Chapter 18: The Fall of ExoGeni

"Sir, we have a problem…" Joker paused "the colonists have gone completely insane!"

"WHAT?" Kaidan's voice asked over the comm. "What are they doing?"

"They're beating on the hull and doors of the Normandy, trying to break in!"

Shepard responded "It must be the Thorian…"

"What's the Thorian?" Joker and Kaidan asked simultaneously on the screens inside Shepard's helmet, before Joker looked down and added "Shepard, there's a lot of Geth headed your way, be prepared."

"An ancient plant that dates back to at least the days of the Protheans, it's using its spores to mind-control the colonists and using them to defend itself. Do not under any circumstances open the doors, Joker, and Kaidan, do not attack or run over the colonists with your units, we'll deal with the problem, Shepard out."

"Shepard, sensors say the force field that blocked us earlier should be down now." Tali reported

"Good, let's get moving." They backtracked and found Lizbeth Baynham inside the Restorer that was there to pick them up at a balcony about halfway down the building, hovering there, nearly touching the building, without even vibrating as Shepard jumped onboard, followed by the rest of the crew.

Shepard removed his gauntlets and helmet before grabbing her by the neck and throwing her up against the nearest bulkhead, jamming his laser pistol into her face, pressing the barrel into the flesh of her forehead "You'd better get explaining right now, how much did you know about the Thorian project? Why exactly did you stay behind anyways?"

"I was trying to send a distress call, but I was cut off before I could, and then they dumped me here in this building while they got away and left me… I always was too vocal about my dislike for the program, but when you're threatened with death, what can you do?" She shrugged helplessly, talking in a raspy voice, and instinctively clawing at Shepard's forearm armour.

"Hmm, well, why was ExoGeni so interested in the Thorian?" Shepard asked, feeling the faint hum of the Restorer's engines as they activated and propelled the craft back on a leisurely route over the skyway toward the Way Station where all the ExoGeni scum were holed up. The PA speakers made pathetic "pew pew" noises, indicating the gunship's chin Quad Light Laser firing.

"They wanted to see what made the Thorian special, maybe learn to mind-control people." Her responses matched up with the VI's, good, Shepard would not have to execute her "I'd like to come along with you and try to help bust them down to size…"

"Glad to hear it, but if you try something, remember, we have armour and heavier guns, you don't." He let her go, picking up her Gauss Pistol and latching it to his belt. "If you're proven truly innocent you get this back." She nodded, or tried to, before he realized she couldn't really nod with a hand around her neck, and dropped her onto the ground.

"This is Juliana Baynham, requesting immediate assistance from any nearby Coalition units, I repeat—" The transmission was cut off by the sound of scuffling

"GET AWAY FROM THE COMM ARRAY WOMAN!" Ethan Jeong's voice howled before the transmission cut out.

Shepard narrowed his eyes and snarled into his own comm. "Ashley, fire up the afterburners, Jeong has to pay, NOW!"

"Aye, skipper." The marine responded, her voice also incredibly cold.

"This is a general distress call, Feros is under attack by Geth and—" Juliana had apparently got to the transmitter again and started to send off a general distress call before the transmission was cut off with the sound of metal hitting flesh, a scream of pain, and a final click of a rifle's safety disengaging. Lizbeth hugged her knees to her chest in her seat as the four squad members sat in the entrance hall near the airlock (Ashley was piloting from a console and thus had to stay standing), all seething with fury.

"Fuckers gonna pay… motherfuckers gonna pay for this, boys." Ashley said after a brief silence, turning and grabbing her weapon, heading into the airlock after Lizbeth, her helmet shaking with fury.

There was no response, merely silence as the airlock cycled open and the squad walked down the ramp into the way station. They took cover as they noted some ExoGeni Security personnel dragging a kicking and screaming Juliana away, she was roaring like a madwoman "You won't get away with this, Jeong!"

Lizbeth ran to her mother, bowling over the two security guards and hugging her "Mom, you're alright!" she cried, squeezing her mother tightly before turning her attention to Jeong, whose hand drifted down to his pistol as he regarded the very angry young woman.

"Hello, Jeong, miss us?" Shepard materialized out of nowhere in front of Jeong and stared the man down as the rest of the squad emerged from cover, their weapons levelled at the ExoGeni guards.

"Shepard, what a coincidence, you know, I found some rather interesting things about you in our company's databases, now, you wouldn't want that stuff to get out, would you. Also, now that communications are back online, ExoGeni wants the colony cleansed, the colonists have a problem with that… they seem to be… resisting." Jeong was being the stereotypical gloating jerk, and Shepard was currently counting down the greasy son of a bitch's life span in seconds.

"Oh, so you're a front company for the Order of the Illuminate just looking to kill a few more UEF and to use technology based on the Thorian to control the Aeon government?" Shepard asked lightly.

"No, we have nothing to do with those Order scum, we just want to restore peace and order, no matter the cost, guards!" The guards didn't move an inch, all staring at their boss incredulously.

"It seems your guards weren't as loyal to you as you'd thought." Shepard's helmet's eye lights formed slits "Now, where were we?"

"You'll never take me!" Jeong went for his pistol, but before he could even raise it Shepard caught his hand in an armoured fist and squeezed down hard with the pneumatics in the suit. Jeong's hand bones shattered and splintered like dry twigs under the armour's strength, which was somewhat above that of a Krogan, and the scumbag screamed.

"You're right, I'll never take you, Tali, Flamethrower?" He had picked the man up with one hand and held him in the air, unable to do any damage to the armour whatsoever with his kicking and clawing.

"Here, Shepard." Tali handed the weapon to him, curious as to what he would do.

"Thank you, now, where were we?" a momentary burst from the flamethrower spewed heated white phosphorus fragments, mixed with some napalm, all over Jeong's legs. The man screamed as the burning fragments melted into his skin and dug into his flesh, and his clothes caught on fire, Shepard maintaining his armoured grip on the burning man until in the end, only a charred corpse remained "Now, if any others want to purge the colony, just say so and we'll see what to do with you." He palmed the flamethrower almost sadistically.

Liara and Tali stood still in horrified silence while Ashley and Garrus thought the man deserved it for trying to pull a gun on Shepard and claiming that the colony should be exterminated just because ExoGeni thought so. Once Shepard finished scaring the guards into utter silence, Liara pulled him aside "Shepard, why did you do that?"

"Didn't you hear him? 'Cleansed', how many UEF and Cybran colonies and planets were cleansed in the Infinite War? How many human worlds were cleansed by the Seraphim Imperium in the Seraphim War? Do you have any idea what that word invokes for humans everywhere?" He stopped short and bowed his head "I'll never forget the memories passed down from other, long-dead Cybrans…" he looked up at the Asari, who was leaning backward in fear "Sorry, Liara, I just… lost control for a bit, but look on the bright side, we saved the colonists from ExoGeni, didn't we?" She nodded mutely; still horrified that such an honourable, kind and friendly individual could do such a horrible thing.

"Commander, can we talk before you leave?" Juliana waved them over.

"Certainly, what is it?"

"I'd like to ask you to spare as many colonists as possible, Commander, I have a modified nerve gas that should be enough to take down the colonists because of their current condition as puppets of the Thorian, it's not weapons grade, but still… If you have to, melee them and bind them, but please, don't kill them…" her eyes searched the expressionless helmet for a response.

John Shepard chuckled "Madam, I would have spared the colonists anyways, but thank you, what is the formula for this gas? Could you upload it to my armour?"

"Yes, yes, I'll do that now…" She said, typing into her forearm computer pod quickly and hitting a final button. A beep and notification on Shepard's HUD indicated he'd received it.

Beside him, Liara smiled under her helmet, this was the Shepard she had come to know over the last month or so, and the man she felt more than a professional interest towards. She hoped that she would not see the other Shepard, whoever he was, for a long time…

"Thank you, madam, I will do as you asked." He set his armour's micro-nanolathe to create canisters filled with the gas for grenades, as well as giving the schematic to the rest of the team

* * *

Ashley watched the rather sizeable gunship lift off before turning around "Well, the boring-ass flight is over now." The Restorer had airlifted them to Zhu's Hope, having cleared the Geth in the way beforehand, while they were dealing with Jeong.

"What is that?" Liara asked, pointing at a creature hunched up on the ground like a Geth in storage mode.

"I don't know, but it sure looks like it won't be friendly…" Tali said, approaching the creature hesitantly, jumping back when it stood up and began stumbling toward the group.

"Sure looks like a zombie from a zombie apocalypse vid, especially the ones made back in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries." Shepard said, tilting his head "Tali, shotgun it."

"Will do, She—" Tali had levelled her gun and pulled the trigger.

BOOM/SPLAT! (Some combination thereof)

"Keelah, that thing splattered…" Tali said, still pointing the shotgun where the creature had been, blinking her helmet lights in conjunction with her eyes as the disgusting goo slid off her shields onto the ground.

"Yeah…" Shepard said, unconsciously and instinctively wiping some off Liara's helmet's shields with an armoured hand (essentially, wiping a smudge off her face gently).

"What was that thing?" Garrus asked, prodding a piece of leg that had remained intact after the phased plasma blew the creature to bits via explosive boiling and internal pressure

"Probably something the Thorian came up with, remember team, when you shoot these guys, don't shoot the colonists, use your gas grenades for that, they don't have enclosed helmets, you have full NBC protection, use it." Shepard looked to the team, getting affirmative responses from all of them. "Joker, you have an estimated number of colonists?"

"19, Commander, another few hundred are all beating at the ship, the shields are holding just fine, so no worries."

"Thanks, Joker, Shepard Out." Shepard turned to the team again, arrayed outside the garage door "Guys, I'll cloak and deal with the colonists. Tali, pop it." The door opened up and down before spreading to the sides quickly. Shepard, cloaked, slipped through and around the barricades on the upper level before dropping a gas canister in the midst of the five controlled colonists behind the barricade. They went down without a sound as Shepard de-cloaked to save energy, hooked the canister to his belt to recharge, signalling the squad to move up. It was too bad Cybran Heavy armour could not be permanently cloaked, unlike Cybran Light.

As they methodically cleared out the garage and hallway of all the creatures, it was found that Gauss munitions, unless explosive, were far less effective than Phasic or even laser bolts. It was also found that the nerve gas meant one-hit kills on the creatures. The group headed into the elevator after clearing their areas of goodies and threats.

Shepard's first gas grenade was intercepted by the creatures, Thorian Creepers as his threat detector designated them, and killed half of the ones in the room, allowing the three colonists to open fire with their SMGs, shotguns, and pistols from the other end of the chamber. Citadel-standard mass accelerator rounds roared past the team, forcing them to spam grenades, so as to not hurt the colonists with ricocheting rounds. When the haze of gas had more or less filled the room, the group moved forward, stepping in the dead creepers and examining the colonists to make sure they were still alive, as well as stripping them of weapons.

After a long and winding path through the colony, hordes of creepers, and the colonists that stayed behind, Shepard's squad used the construction crane to lift a section of the crashed freighter in the colony and exposed an entrance to the underground. Fai Dan came around the corner, holding a gauss pistol in shaking hands as he breathed heavily. "It wants me to fight you, to kill you, but I won't… I WON'T" then, before Shepard or squad could do anything, he lifted the pistol to his head and pulled the trigger, his brains splattering on the ground as he fell.

"Well, that's one more death due to this Thorian, let's give him hell." Shepard growled, leading the team down into the catacombs of the Thorian's lair.

"Omni Sensor shows a large structure ahead… a central core for the Thorian, according to the data Lizbeth and her mother provided." Tali reported, a massive red symbol appearing ahead of them.

"Hmm, not as big as I expected, certainly smaller than an ACU or SCU" Shepard said, looking at the displayed blob's size.

"WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" Ashley exclaimed as they walked into the Thorian's chamber.

"It must be the Thorian." Garrus said, shrugging nonchalantly as Ashley glared pointedly at him.

"Well, that was fairly obvious, it's just an expression, Garrus."

"Oh, okay."

"So, guys, sorry to interrupt but what should we do about this Thorian?" Shepard asked, clapping each of them on the shoulder.

"Shoot it a lot of times?" Ashley suggested.

"Uh, Ashley, I doubt it would be that simple." Garrus returned.

"Shepard, I think the thing just moved…" that was Liara.

"Stand back, troops, let's see what this sucker is up to…" Shepard tightened his grip on his weapon, but did not raise it; the creature might be willing to "talk" if they did not seem openly hostile…

* * *

"Never mind…" Shepard said as he was hit by a Warp from the green Asari, it was one of the downsides of Cybran armours; they sacrificed some flexibility, manoeuvrability, and protection for their stealth and cloaking capabilities. Said cloaking capability appeared to be utterly useless at the moment as he was still being fired upon even though he was cloaked (and stealthed), this Thorian was probably a detector of some kind… He rolled out of the way of a Throw just as Liara's own Warp deflected off the green Asari's Barrier. Tali was currently stuck in stasis some distance away, so she could not use dampening on the Asari, and Ashley was behind a crate thanks to the Asari's shotgun at close range, with Carnage. Garrus was nowhere to be seen, until a single overcharged laser bolt dropped the Asari's barrier and Liara's Lift struck home. Shepard wasted no time in starting to burn through the Asari's shields, armour and body, she'd told them a lot about the Thorian, and he could understand the creature, but still, it had to die.

"Hey, what's that?" Liara pointed over Shepard's shoulder at a pulsating node of flesh in the next room.

"I don't know, let's investigate… oh shit."

SPLAT!

Another green Asari clone landed on the ground, equipped with black skin-tight armour and a shotgun. The team took a few moments before entering the next room and hitting the node with their heavy weapons, especially Tali's flamethrower that lit up the darkness of the underground passages that housed the Thorian, and the creature screamed. Blue-white flames lit up the room in an eerie semblance of hell as red lines, yellow streaks, and violet pulses pounded into the mass of fleshy… stuff.

After marauding around the underground, burning creepers to ash and blasting Asari clones to pieces of cooling meat, the squad finally used their heavy weapons to blast the final Thorian Node to pieces. A distant screeching noise fading into the distance announced the fall of the Thorian before a distant splat ended the screech. Garrus noticed a pod one the wall distorting and alerted Shepard "Something's moving in that pod!"

"Be prepared, but hold fire unless fired upon."

With a tearing noise and a wet splat the pod ripped open, fluids gushing onto the floor as an Asari with light purple skin landed on her hands and knees before getting back up. She seemed to be dressed in the same type of armour and equipped with the same type of shotgun as the clones from before, and looked to be the source of the genetic material.

"Who are you?" Shepard asked, holding his gun at ease and motioning for the others to stop pointing their weapons at the Asari. "What are you doing here?"

"Shiala? What are you doing here?" Liara frowned behind her helmet. "Does my mother have anything to do with this?"

"Liara? Is that you?" The Asari seemed slightly confused until Liara took off her helmet. "Well, yes, I followed Lady Benezia on her quest to turn Saren around from his destructive path."

"So why are you here, and not with Benezia or Saren?" Shepard asked.

"Saren came here to get the Cipher from the Thorian, so that he could understand the images from the beacon on Eden Prime. The Thorian has been here since the days of the Protheans, and has much knowledge on how they thought and communicated; it even assimilated the occasional murdered Prothean dumped in the under-levels of the city. He used my mind-melding ability to get the Cipher from the Thorian and transfer it to his own mind, giving me to the Thorian in exchange… He's looking for the Conduit, looking to get to it before Commander Shepard can. I'm guessing you're the Commander?"

"Yes, I am, Commander and Spectre Shepard, why did Benezia end up following Saren instead of turning him? And can you give me a copy of the Cipher?"

"Saren's flagship is a dreadnought of immense power and ridiculous size, it has an aura, a power about it, that makes you follow him… I cannot describe it, the closest term I can think of is… indoctrination. Benezia, myself and all her other disciples that followed her on this venture came under its control… I can give you a copy of the Cipher through a meld, please remove your helmet, eye contact is required… Embrace Eternity!"

* * *

"Whoa!" Shepard said once the data stream was finished transferring.

"You mind is… amazingly efficient at processing and cataloguing data, almost like a computer in its efficiency." Shiala said, slightly in awe of the speed with which the Commander absorbed the data.

"Thank you for the Cipher, Shiala, but unfortunately I still have difficulty understanding the vision, but thank you regardless…" Shepard shook his head gently. "Come on, team, let's get back above ground and help the colonists, Kaidan's evac trucks should be arriving right about… now." He stumbled a bit, and Liara caught him, looking at his face concernedly

"Shepard, are you alright?"

"I'm fine, let's get back above ground, Shiala, come with us, we need to get you medical attention."

"No offence, but you sure it's wise to let someone who was at one point indoctrinated onto the Normandy, Shepard?" Garrus inquired, tilting his head at the Commander

"I was planning to stay and help the colonists however I could, I need to atone for my sins, even though I was indoctrinated at the time. A couple of my contacts in Asari Space would be willing to buy goods manufactured here, I think."

"That's a good idea, Shiala, the colonists are going to need as much support as they can get, now that we evicted ExoGeni." Shepard said slowly as he lumbered up the stairs, coming face-to-face with the ExoGeni employees who had arrived at Zhu's Hope from their bunkers.

"Well, ExoGeni, what have you to say for yourselves?" Shepard and Liara had put their helmets back on at the first sign of trouble, and the five-man team had arranged themselves in a bullet formation with Shiala in the center, protected by several overlapping over-shields (which are spherical and are projected around the body, not personal like standard shields on the armours). Their weapons were arrayed toward the ExoGeni guards, who raised their arms in surrender

"Whoa, Commander, we're just here to congratulate you on a job well done, the colony will survive, looking at things now… and it'll probably thrive, we'll try to convince ExoGeni to provide some funding…"

"You've done enough, ExoGeni people, now, it's time for the Coalition to step in and take care of the colonists." A series of thuds announced the arrival of a pair of Brick Armoured Assault Bots (with flak upgrade), eight Mech Marines, two Ascendant AA units, and eight trucks with a Continental T3 Air Transport blotting out the sun above their section of the ruins, a wing of Geminis swooping overhead, mowing down any remaining Geth ships. After the ground finished shaking from the landing of the 3000-ton Armoured Assault Bots (and other units, but they didn't even weigh as much as one Brick, all put together), the ExoGeni personnel watched as the loudspeakers on the trucks blared to life and announced ExoGeni's misdeeds. Suffice it to say they had to leave via the truck a Stinger gunship flew in for them to avoid lethal injury by way of that which was known as "supremely pissed colonist".

"The Coalition of Species has arrived and built you a proper city, complete with actual farm land and industrial base, please board the evac trucks now." Kaidan's voice boomed over the speakers, the civilians appeared hesitant until Shepard made an announcement and revealed his identity as humanity's first Spectre. They began believing after that, though only 20% agreed to go on the first flight. The remainder took two waves to leave, considering there were a little over five thousand total colonists and each truck could only hold 200 in full comfort (though 800 could easily crowd into a truck in times of emergency). The Continental had picked up more trucks after the first flight; hence the colonists had all been moved in three flights. The ExoGeni personnel were declared protected by Shepard because "After they found out what happened, they helped execute their leader, Ethan Jeong, thus, they will remain here and perform civil service for you! Lizbeth and Juliana Baynham provided mission-critical Intel, I, Commander Shepard, hereby nominate Juliana Baynham as the Colonial Administrator of this colony for a three-year term."

Needless to say, Juliana, since she had always been popular among the colonists, won the elections that occurred while the colonists were still being transported in their trucks. The Continental had moved them to just inside the cleared area of ground and set them down on the highway, running through the open fields of fresh soil, ready to grow forests and grasslands, then past areas of towering agricultural facilities (multiple floors) for growing crops and processing food, then past the T3 Power Generators that would power the city, then into the city proper. The greenhouses and Power Generators had only been put up on one side of the "city", which consisted of only a few towers so far but had plenty of space in which to expand.

Shepard left the celebrating colonists after a while and boarded the Normandy once more. "That turned out pretty well, I just hope they'll get a happily ever after…"

"Yes." Liara said beside him, the rest of the team had gone back to the Normandy already, leaving Liara, Shiala and Shepard to watch over the new city meeting its first sunrise.

"I agree, it's been a long time, Liara, how have you been in these last few years?" Shiala asked the younger Asari.

"Oh, right, I was going to ask, how long have you two known each other?"

"Shiala helped my mother teach me when I was young; she was also the one that helped train me with my Biotics and combat skills."

"You taught her well, then. Perhaps we should go back to the Normandy, Shiala needs a checkup and I think the colonists are too busy celebrating right now, you two can catch up back there."

"All right, Shepard." Liara said amicably as the Restorer turned around and flew away from the new city. "I was thinking, about the Cipher, perhaps I could try to help you understand it through a meld, I have heard of such therapies before, perhaps you just need a different perspective on the visions…"

"No problem, Liara, you can meld with me anytime you want." That did not come out the way Shepard wanted it to, judging by Liara's purple blush and Shiala's curious gaze flitting between himself and Liara, but it's no use crying over spilt milk.

"Okay, Commander, clear your mind except for the thoughts of the Cipher and the vision, please… embrace eternity!" Shiala watched as her former student's eyes opened again almost completely black, then turned away to give them some privacy while she looked around at the halls of this gunship. If it was a gunship, it was a very large one, enough to qualify as a small frigate or corvette by Council standards.

* * *

"Commander Shepard," the consistently annoyed Turian began, "Your helmsman forwarded us the report on Feros."

"ExoGeni should have informed us of the Thorian," Councillor Tevos added, frowning at her companion's tone. Shepard's mind was yelling _Hallelujah; tell us something we don't know_.

"It is a pity that the Thorian was destroyed; it would have been an interesting subject for study," Armin, the Salarian, put in his own two cents.

Shepard's eyes flashed dangerously in anger "ExoGeni tried and look how that turned out." The Turian's mandibles twitched in irritation, then again, Shepard doubted he'd ever stop looking irritated, must be something to do with the Monkeylord laser barrel (a 100-meter long rod) shoved up his ass all the time.

"Yes of course," the Salarian ploughed on, oblivious to the Spectre's rising ire "the mission must always take priority. At least the colony was saved."

"Of course it was saved!" the Turian growled angrily, glaring at Shepard "Shepard would go to any lengths to save a human colony!"

Shepard's mouth fell open in shock. Did he just accuse him of saving a colony just because it was a human one? "Being human had nothing to do with it!" he exploded, pacing back and forth in front of the screen, glaring and pointing accusingly at the Turian.

"Alright," he commanded in an ice-cold voice, his brown eye blazing "Here's what you do," he stabbed his finger toward the Turian, "Find me a Turian colony under attack by Geth, preachers, tax collectors, strategic missiles, Orcs, Zombies, Krogan, or whatever the flying fuck it happens to be and I'll go out and rescue them! How's that sound, Councillor?" Shepard's tone made it very clear that he thought the Turian only got the job because his own people didn't want him in their space, EVER, for fear of losing face due to having such an idiot in their race.

"You would do well to remember your place, Shepard," Councillor Velarn spat, annoyed, Tevos tried to make eye gestured for him to shut the fuck up, but she failed to get the point across, locked her holographic image, and facepalmed, before re-engaging her hologram sync sot that it wouldn't be too evident the hologram was frozen in place for a few seconds.

"Sometimes, I despair," Shepard went on, jabbing his finger at the Turian. "If I had failed to save the colony, you'd be trying to rip me a new one over that. I save the colony and you flat out accuse me of being a racist, xenophobic jerk! You expect me to hunt down Saren, yet what support have you shown me? Zilch, absolutely nothing, instead you get angry at everything I do, if you could detect when I breathed in and out, I bet I'd get one e-mail notification expressing your irritation every few seconds. If you want to keep getting regular reports, which were NOT MANDATORY as you stated in my Spectre specifications, can you stop getting angry all the time? You need some time to think, and you need to GROW UP!" Shepard's fist came down on the button to terminate the conversation with a loud thump.

* * *

"Shiala, how are you feeling?" Liara walked into the med bay, empty except for Shiala, who was sitting on one of the medical beds, watching the few videos and documentaries about the Coalition of Species normally accessible to people from non-Coalition species. Liara, Garrus, Wrex and Tali all had extensive access to the Coalition's portions of the extranet, though of course secrets such as nanolathing and mass fabrication remained off-limits.

"Hello, Liara" Shiala had just finished the documentaries. "I've been better, so, you and Shepard?" She raised an eyebrow, or rather, one of the darkly coloured skin patches that were for some odd reason present on the brows of all Asari.

"We're just friends…" Liara shuffled her feet and bit her upper lip, looking down toward the ground.

"I get the feeling that's not all you'd like to be, Liara, I've seen the way you look at him, and I'm pretty sure that I haven't gone blind, so I can say that the way he looks at you is like the way you look at him, take a leap of faith, Liara, you'd be surprised at what you'll find." The Matron smiled, Maidens were either too outgoing or too shy it seemed her former student was the latter.

"Okay, I'll talk to him about it, when I'm ready… whenever that may be."

"That's all I can ask of you, now, what do you think of the Coalition of Species? How's your armour?" Shiala was back to the Asari Liara remembered, all business and with a fascination of weapons unusual among Asari after their maiden stage. Liara was relieved; the conversation had gotten just a tad personal…

* * *

_Over Chasca, Matano System, Maroon Sea, June 30, 3868_

"No transmissions whatsoever, Shepard, not even Omni's detecting anything." Joker said slowly, scanning the readouts as they were displayed

"That's because there's nothing to detect, considering how many sensor suites an Omni includes, it is physically impossible to hide from every single one of them effectively." Shepard said, pacing about the conference room, eyes glued to the screen displaying the readouts.

"Well, there are these odd structures next to the colony pioneer team's structures and some odd readings... bringing up the Soothsayer suite now, powering down Omni."

"Shepard? Why are you… Oh." Tali looked down at her wrist computer, which showed the ship's Omni Sensor powering down, leaving just more than enough energy to operate the Soothsayer Perimeter Monitoring System at full power, tunnelling through the cloud cover with its intensive scanning abilities and revealing a visual of the operations area. The ship's power output was very high for its size, almost equal to that of four Council Cruisers (or around a sixth of a Dreadnought's power output), but even that could not sustain both Omni and Soothsayer at the same time, at full power.

"Turning over control, Shepard." Joker announced, and Shepard seized the console controls, zooming in on the odd structures.

"Dragon's Teeth, ExoGeni shipped Dragon's teeth to the Seven Hand Node… probably another part of their disgusting super soldier project. Suit up, team, we're going in, Kaidan, you're coming with me, Garrus needs to take a break, Ashley, you get to take him on a joyride in the Restorer, fly close air support after dropping us, thanks."

"Understood, Shepard" Ashley said, Garrus nodded to him and followed her.

"Get ready and get in the Restorer, guys, we have a zombie apocalypse to clean up, the communiqué about ExoGeni's activities is already on its way to Brackman, Hall and Rhianne through my contacts, and the Coalition will soon be coming down on ExoGeni like a ton of bricks."

"Are you sure your contacts are reliable?" That was Wrex.

"I'd say I can trust Hackett, my own mother, and Ashley's mother to get the point through." Shepard raised an eyebrow at the Krogan.

"Oh, okay, that's probably… good enough." Wrex went back to checking his Sonic Pulse Shotgun and blowing specks of dust off of it.

* * *

"Coming in for a landing, Shepard. We're down."

"Move out!" Shepard led the group out of the Restorer, which lifted off after the last of them exited and the airlock sealed.

A standard UEF-issue pioneer habitation pod, a square structure that looked like a mottled grey brick, came into view before the team, utterly silent and seemingly normal but for the six dragon's teeth that flanked the structure. Shepard's team advanced toward the structure with caution, Omni-sensors pinging the ground repeatedly to check for traps while moving forward. The other habitation pod was further south and seemed clear.

"Where is everyone?" Liara asked "Even if all the pioneer team members were turned into husks, we should be seeing some…"

"I have a bad feeling about this…" Kaidan said, bending down to examine a wrist computer bad that had been dropped some time ago.

"Kaidan, you never, EVER say stuff like that!" Wrex boomed before Shepard noticed something poking around a corner, zoomed in on the husk's head, and blew it off.

Husks flowed around the structures toward the team, who were effectively in the middle of open ground, with high-powered automatic weapons, which made the charge a very foolish means of attack. "It just had to be a UEF pioneer team, didn't it, couldn't have been Cybran…" Shepard shook his head as he opened fire with his GLMG, Liara opting for her ULPA (A/N: In case you forget, that's Ultra-Light Phasic Autogun), Kaidan also choosing his ULPA, Tali firing with her shotgun and Wrex using his Gauss Chaingun. Considering the Gauss Chaingun fired rounds at a little over thirty per second, three times the rate of the GLMG (though much heavier and less manoeuvrable) and five times the rate of the LBR on Assault Mode, the Husks in Wrex's field of fire didn't stand a chance, torn utterly asunder by the hail of hypersonic munitions that blasted fist-sized chunks out of their bodies.

"Why, what's so special about Cybrans and husks?" Tali asked as she blew away another Husk with a shotgun blast while Shepard was switching out for his Temporal Fizz Launcher.

"For some reason, once a husk that used to be Cybran gets off one of the Dragon's Teeth, the implants in the brain launch a coordinated assault via biological and synthetic pathways that overwhelm the husk programming and circuitry and assimilate it back into Cybran material. Out of all the hundreds of Cybrans turned into husks on Eden Prime, only one has died, and that was from a car crash, go figure." Shepard was busy launching Fizz after Fizz into the ranks of the husks, blowing great holes in the horde.

"That's… incredible technology." Tali answered, finally taking out her flamethrower to deal with the husks that closed in rapidly, then she shouted a battle-cry: "I will leave a dark cloud!"

"Tali, you've been spending too long playing remakes of twenty-first century video games, haven't you?" Kaidan shook his head sadly while hitting the husks on the other side of Tali's position in a series of Throws, Liara had already gathered them in singularities, so the net result was two rapidly moving singularities forcibly evicting husks from the general area of the team. Shepard and Wrex were mowing down any stragglers and then depleting the numbers in the singularities, while Tali, on her side of the battlefield, happily set them all a-blazing.

Once they finished scorching, shooting, lacerating, disintegrating, etc. the husks, the team advanced into one of the buildings, Shepard, cloaked, was spearheading. Each of the ten husks in each building went down without any warning except a momentary flash of light, if that, from the cloaked Cybran. The group then proceeded to thoroughly loot the structures before heading off toward the science station. They wanted answers for what they had found, though none of them were UEF, they knew what ExoGeni had done, and they wanted to gather more evidence to make the motherfuckers pay for their sins.

The first thing they noticed around the Science Facility was the same utterly dead air that had been around the two habitation buildings, and more Dragon's Teeth. The entryway was eerily quiet and clear of any husks. Shepard's energy reserves had recharged somewhat by this time, so he cloaked and proceeded inside to scout out the facility. The first rooms had no husks present, while the second set of rooms had a veritable horde of the cybernetic zombies. A few grenades thinned out their numbers before Shepard retreated due to cloak energy level, and the team came in.

Ten husks rushed them, in enclosed spaces, Wrex and Tali's shotguns completely mowed them down while Liara and Kaidan's biotics held them up. Shepard's Fizz Launcher helped, in both respects. After clearing pieces of husks from their armour, the team fanned out in the facility, looking for information and, of course, loot.

"Shepard, I've found some data!" Kaidan called from the other back room.

"Coming… OW!" Shepard yelled.

"What happened, Shepard?" Liara asked from her position in the doorway to the bathroom, looking at Shepard, who was holding the back of his head, curiously.

"I had my head stuck under the sink and my ass in the air looking for bugs we could extract data from when Kaidan called and I tried to stand up." Shepard said, rubbing the back of his head as he got up. "Needless to say, without a helmet, the bottom of a sink meeting the back of your head isn't very comfortable."

"Oh, well, you are alright, aren't you? No concussion or anything?" Shepard smiled at Liara's worried face, it was pretty cute, after all.

"I'm fine, Liara, now, let's go see what Kaidan's found this time." He gave her a pat on the back as he passed, Liara falling into stride after him.

"Whatever it is, I'm sure it'll be interesting." They came to Kaidan's position in front of a computer console, the others already present and gathered around the Lieutenant.

"Sir, we have evidence that the entire pioneer team is dead and that the samples ExoGeni sent the Seven Hand were the only things responsible, the last log by anyone was when they were investigating the Dragon's Teeth."

"When was it?"

"Just before the attack on Eden Prime, Shepard" Kaidan answered.

"If the Dragon's Teeth are Geth technology… that means Feros had Geth presence long before they sent the SOS signal… ExoGeni's list of sins has just grown a lot longer, refusing to inform the Coalition of an invasion that could trigger a war…" Shepard said menacingly, staring off into space while his team contemplated it. ExoGeni would die.

"Come on, guys, let's call in the Coalition and go investigate that facility…" Kaidan said, snapping out of it.

"You're right, Kaidan, we gotta get moving, let's get to the Vostok System, Ashley, pick us up."

* * *

_Nodacrux, Vostok System, Maroon Sea, July 1, 3868_

"Wonder what samples this shipment consisted of?" Liara said "I hope it's not more Dragon's Teeth…"

"That would be nasty, considering this facility is only manned by UEF and Aeon scientists, no Cybrans, so no one will be able to resist the conversion…" Ashley agreed, Garrus and Wrex were "chilling" on the Normandy for this mission, Kaidan and Ashley replacing them on the assignment.

"Well, Tali's Omni's showing a bunch of hostiles, let's go get some practice, shall we, Ash?" Kaidan said.

"Sure"

"Hmm, let's see…" Shepard butted in "They're Thorian Creepers, not very difficult, and you two need some more combat practice, so Tali, Liara, let's stand back and let them have some fun for once."

"Understood, Shepard." Tali said through the helmet she wore outside of her suit, she had a slight advantage over other Aeon Light armours in that she had another layer under it, but considering the amount of power required to punch through any Coalition armour, she'd probably be dead if her armour beached anyways. Liara simply nodded while watching the two marines having a good time with the Creepers, once all the Creepers were down, the group moved toward the southern road to the facility, which was surrounded by steep slopes.

"Things are too quiet out here…" Tali said.

"I think there's plenty of sound, like the birds." Liara said, frowning and tilting her head as if to listen.

"Tali, one thing you should know, never, ever call a mission 'too quiet', if you'd watched any human action movie, you should know that's what the good guys i.e. us, only say that right before we get ambushed by a horde of bad guys." Shepard shot back once he'd finally gotten over the shock of Tali saying what she did.

"Really? Is it some sort of scientific phenomenon?" Tali inquired, before a sudden rustling in the underbrush of the woods made the group tense up and prepare for battle, right before a squirrel ran past them.

"That looked so much like a 'bad guy', Shepard, I mean, it was wearing a dark fur cloak, had a giant puffy tail, and small hands, sure…" Kaidan said sarcastically.

"Kaidan, shut up."

"We're here, boys, stop acting so immature." Ashley sounded extremely bored; she'd been in the middle of this sort of thing between John and James a bit too often for her tastes.

"I'll hack the door" Tali said resignedly and did so, the door opening to show an entry room absolutely stuffed with Thorian Creepers.

"How the hell did they ship so many here?" Liara asked in wonder.

"I don't know, but Liara, the Light Plasma Cannon is yours." It was more like a machine gun, firing two bolts at a time, two per second, and didn't have as much firepower as a Selen Combat Scout (with upgrades), but it still packed one hell of a punch against anything less than a Light Tank.

"Wrex would have made this a lot more convenient." Ashley said "That Gauss Chaingun would be nice for cutting these things down."

"Yeah, well, that's life, deal with it." Shepard said from his position on the other side of road, setting up his Temporal Fizz Launcher. "Tali, get a bit closer and set your flamethrower to narrow spray."

"What will that do exactly?" Tali said, advancing.

"Increase your range to about forty meters from twenty, that'll be nice here in the bottleneck the doors create." Shepard stated calmly. "On my signal, Kaidan, Ash, start firing, Liara, you do the same, and be careful with the aim, Tali, you get to bathe the entryway in white phosphorus, I'll cover you from anything that gets by the flames."

A series of affirmatives rang out and Shepard nodded to himself "Open up!" The Thorian Creepers, bottled in as they were in the main chambers of the facility, didn't stand a chance, mostly because they were too dumb to at least try to use other exits to flank the team. They were pierced, burnt, lacerated, or vaporized by the deluge of doom that bore down on them. After the Omni sensors of Tali's suit cheerfully reported that the area had been cleared of hostiles, and revealed a number of neutral symbols designated as human bio-signatures hiding in the left back room of the compound, the building was cheerfully stripped of all goodies by the team.

After doing a thorough job of looting the place, Shepard finally decided to hack the other door, revealing a large number of cowering scientists. "Thank God, they sent help!" One woman exclaimed, standing up from behind a piece of cover "I'm Doctor Ross, in charge of this facility, a few days ago, these… things… started appearing out of nowhere and attacking us, we don't know where they came from, we don't know what they were, but they looked like zombies fro those old vids…"

"Miss Ross, I recommend you immediately shut the fuck up." Ashley said coldly, gripping her rifle tighter.

"Do you know what I did on Feros?" Shepard asked in a completely flat tone. "I found out what ExoGeni did, the Coalition has taken over the colony. With the ever-growing list of sins, ExoGeni is finished; now please explain to me why I shouldn't just arrest you here and now?"

"Wait, please! Don't report us to the Coalition! We have a considerable amount of research funds left over; maybe you'll be better able to make use of them. We just want passage off this planet." Dr. Ross was getting on Shepard's nerves.

"I'm sorry, if you had just requested to be taken off-planet, I wouldn't have minded, but that bribe… I can't do that."

"It is as I feared, Security!" The Doctor ducked behind her crate as a group of Blue Suns mercenaries opened fire on the team. Though they were equipped with Coalition-standard weapons, they didn't have armour to match, and considering the two biotics and one and a half tech specialists on Shepard's team… the fight was a short one.

Shepard walked up to Ross, who was heaving laboured breaths as she clutched a leg wound, trying to stem the blood flow "ExoGeni's experiments are a crime to humanity, since you were an accomplice and violently resisted arrest, plus tried to kill party members of a Council Spectre, and are currently in Council Space, I sentence you to… death." He lifted his laser pistol between the woman's eyes and pulled the trigger before she could react.

Ross's mouth was hanging half-open, about to speak, and her eyes were crossed, staring at the weapon, as she toppled over to one side, hands slipping off the leg wound, which soon stopped bleeding as her heart gave up. An ugly burn hole in the middle of her forehead, the flesh around it burnt and half-exploded (due to rapidly boiling water), marked where the laser bolt had penetrated her skull. The hole steamed slowly in the silence that had settled. "That's the last of them, the ExoGeni scum, now let's loot this place for all its worth and call in the Coalition to clean up for us."

"Shepard, we have data on another ExoGeni survey team that dropped out of contact a short time ago, in the Hades Gamma cluster, in the Antaeus system." Kaidan reported from the room's terminal.

"How many sins must one corporation commit?" Liara asked, horrified that even more people from the same company had vanished.

"An infinitude, Liara, an infinitude" Shepard enunciated slowly, looking down pityingly at Ross's corpse and shaking his head. "And of course, the corporate heads always have people to throw between themselves and death, but ExoGeni's leaders will be exterminated, by my own hand if need be."

* * *

_Trebin, Antaeus System, Hades Gamma, July 2, 3868_

"What are sensors telling us?" Shepard asked, standing in the Restorer's CIC, directing the gunship toward its destination with right-clicks on the strategic interface.

"There's some sort of transmitter on the surface that's been giving off unusual signals, we can't get an accurate read on it."

"Well, we're coming up on the site, aw hell."

"What is it, Shepard?" Liara asked over his shoulder.

"It seems to be a Twilight-class stealth Generator protecting a transmitter of some sort, we'll take it down right away. The transmitter seems to be trying to hack into our systems, without any success whatsoever, thanks to Tali, it seems to have a hacking rate akin to two T3 Engineers."

A few seconds of fire from the Quad Light Laser later, the transmitter was in ruins, another second or so later, the Stealth Field Generator was down. More fire reduced the remains of the structures to pieces too small to be salvaged by anyone, and a lot of vaporized metal. "Alright guys, let's get down in the Rhino and see what's up with this place." Ashley said eagerly.

Kaidan shook his head slowly "Please don't sound so eager, Ash, it's taboo in the Marines to be excited for a mission, last I checked."

"Yeah, well, the mission won't do itself." Ashley said, boarding the Rhino through one of the topside airlocks that linked directly to the anchorage clamps the Restorer had to hold such a vehicle.

"True that." Shepard and co. followed, leaving Kaidan to monitor the situation from the Restorer. "Come on boys, let's see what we find…"

They hadn't driven very far when Kaidan announced "I have a visual on the survey team's base, it looks to be completely empty, nothing out of place, no husks or anything in sight."

"Got it, Kaidan, heading to investigate now…"

* * *

"That was creepy" Ashley stated the obvious, they had walked into the 38th century rendition of a ghost town, complete with gusts of wind blowing papers about, and creaking doors. The only signs that people had once lived there were in the flickering consoles, one of which had directed them to the excavation site they were now standing in front of the entrance of.

"Agreed" Shepard led the way down into the mine without further comment.

"Shepard, Omni's detecting something fifty meters below the surface and 300 meters from our current location, under a granite plate, which prevented the survey team from digging straight down." Tali reported.

"That granite piece sounds fabricated, this stinks of Seven Hand work." Ashley commented.

"We have to keep moving, Tali, report when you detect hostiles, everyone else, keep an eye out for anything weird."

After several hundred meters of tunnels, they reached the first landing of sorts, Tali reporting that the next, main, cavern held a lot of husk signatures, ten of them. The squad checked their weapons for the last time before Tali opened the door by hacking the controls. Unfortunately, this was the type of door that opened only to the sides, so they couldn't all fire through the gap like they could with a door that opened up and down. Liara's first Singularity held up four of the husks and the second three more. The remaining three were reduced to pieces by laser bolts, excluding Wrex's, which was shattered by excess sound and resonance. Garrus and Tali were methodically assisting Liara in cutting down the husks stuck in the singularities while the others finished their three and turned to assist.

It didn't take long to mow down the husks with Coalition weaponry, after the last of the cybernetic zombies fell in smoking pieces, the group moved toward the back of the chamber, toward the two doors leading to the excavation tunnels. They activated themselves as the team neared and released another small horde of husks, five from each tunnel. "Shit, the doors were thermal-activated!" Sheppard shouted as he sent the husks to hell a la Temporal Fizz Launcher.

Two explosions rocked the ground as two power containment matrices took too much fire and brewed up, one at the mouth of each tunnel. When the fireballs died down only two husks remained, but they did not remain for long. "Garrus, Wrex, stay here and hold the fort, Tali, Liara, with me, we're checking out the tunnels."

After they'd looked through both tunnels, they found "nothing other than dragon's teeth and this." Shepard held out a tiny fragment of fabric "whoever put the dragon's teeth here left this, it was caught on one corner of the things." It was a corner of a purple Cybran logo. "makes sense according to the date stamp on the last logs, they were before the announcements and warnings about the dangers of dragon's teeth came out. The Seven Hand planted these things here, then later they decided it wasn't efficient enough to just trap a survey team and decided to attack a larger group, that pioneer team we found back on Chasca… it's good that we eliminated their base of operations."

* * *

_Seton's Clutch, southern sector of UEF Space, July 3, 3868_

For hundreds of years, Seton's Clutch had been a place of standoff against the factions that fought over the resources of Alpha Centauri—it was still more efficient to transport raw materials than nanolathe them in those years. Later, it became a strategically critical position that all three factions would fight tooth and claw for to keep within their space. The continental chokepoint had seen battle every few weeks, the remains of countless units could be found buried under the ground, and countless more rest beneath the swirling oceans. The planet had been one of the earlier colonies until the civilians were evacuated and the planet was repurposed for war.

This small stretch of land, only a few hundred kilometres across in any direction, had seen over ten thousand battles and campaigns come and go over the last twelve hundred years. Over a thousand commanders from each side had perished in the fight over this strategically critical world, then at the nexus of UEF, Cybran and Aeon territory. Now, it still was a critical world, at the nexus of the UEF, Cybran, Aeon and Seraphim territories. The Seraphim Republic had taken a region of space formerly occupied by the UEF and Cybrans, between the two major powers, that had been bombed to oblivion in the Seraphim War by the Imperium. The Republic had re-terraformed and settled these worlds with their meagre but growing civilian population, and integrated rather well into the Coalition of Species.

But now, the sounds of war rang again at Seton's Clutch. To the northeast lay the ExoGeni headquarters, moved there after the Seraphim War from a UEF border world, and to the southwest, Elite Commander Dostya and Avatar of War Rhiza personally commanded the assault force that were here to eradicate the bigoted organization after an initial Marine team had gone silent after attempting to arrest the leaders of the corporation. ExoGeni's executives had apparently decided to resist arrest and try to flee, unveiling six UEF ACUs they'd hoarded from the Seraphim War, complete with the newest UEF designs, but lacking the other three tech trees.

The two top-level commanders were holding their ground against six UEF Separatist commanders to the northeast (A/N: There are resource-rich plateaus to the north, east and northeast of the northeast area, and similar for the southwest area of the map) while waiting for Hannah Shepard and Ariel Williams to finish off the small Separatist fleet and gate down to assist. Thankfully, the opposing commanders were restricted to only the UEF build tree, while the two Coalition commanders had access to everything.

Four ranks of fifteen, Harbinger Heavy Armour walkers each, every one four-legged and thirty-five meters tall, clashed with waves of Titan Siege Assault Bots coming from the northeast in the central bottleneck area of land. Athanah Mobile Shield Generators protected the Harbingers, while the other side was forced to rely on Parafield vehicles, the new version of the Parashield, which boosts the structural fields of nearby units as well as projecting a 4000-point shield. It wasn't as good as the Asylum (Aeon T2 Shield Generator), which could hover, but it was more economical considering the amount of structural field boost it could give, up to 1200 points depending on the unit. Athanahs were more than twice as powerful in shields and could cover more radius (shield radii were now adjustable), but were four times the price. Deceivers protected the Harbingers and Athanahs from radar and thus most forms of long-ranged attack while a small horde of Banger Flak Artillery units defended them from aerial assault and the eyes of Air Scouts.

"They're bringing in Percivals!" Dostya warned "I'm finishing my first Megalith, here, two Fatboys to help hold the line, I guess the Monkeylords will need to wait…" she said the last part as if to herself, the two aforementioned Fatboys rolling up to the line, their massive Gauss Cannons immediately swivelling toward the enemy, as displayed on Radar and those Omni Sensors near the front line. Shortly after the lines of Percivals and Parafields marched/rolled into range, the first Fatboy Triple Gauss Cannon shells began to slam into the shields, and then, the fields of the units.

The Parafields cooked off first after their shields fell from the immense power of the high explosive gauss cannon shells, the Armoured Assault Bots, on the other hand, survived long enough to fire on the Harbinger group, taking down their shields and several Harbingers before finally succumbing to overwhelming firepower.

"Thanks, Dostya, requesting Brick support if at all possible, and please bring up that Megalith ASAP." Rhiza urged, moving three Tempest-Class Battleships in from the south sea, they were not quite as durable as standard T3 battleships, but were far, FAR superior (especially with upgrades) in terms of firepower, and could dive. A squadron of Yathsou sub hunters and Siren-class cruisers protected them from aerial assault, provided Air Staging, and supplemented the already awesome torpedo weaponry of the Tempests. Five Bulwark Shield Boats provided wide-area coverage for the less… costly fleet elements, while two Athanahs and two Ascendants hung on the bumpers of each of the Tempests.

* * *

The following is a publically available unit summary accessible to all Coalition citizens, viewer discretion is advised:

COALITION UNIT CODEX: AEON T4 BATTLESHIP: TEMPEST

The Tempest-Class Battleship is one of the Aeon Experimental Units, its primary weapon is the massive Heavy Oblivion Cannon mounted in the centre of its circular, somewhat dome-like hull. The ship also has a large number of torpedo launchers that are able to overwhelm any other torpedo unit one-on-one except for the Atlantis or Megalith (when in water, the Megalith can deploy eight Nanite Torpedo Launchers). However, the Yathsou, when submerged (only trading torpedo fire) can take out a Tempest or Atlantis or Megalith cost-effectively, though it will take a larger number of them to take down the experimentals.

There are 8 bumper-like structures evenly spaced around the circular Tempest-class Battleships, the front and side ones when upgraded have Oblivion Cannons equal in power to those on Omen-class battleships. When surfaced, the rear bumper folds in along with a large area of hull to reveal a construction facility for Tier 1 and 2 ships. The other 4 bumpers could be upgraded to carry hovering units of any type, though the units would stay on the surface if the ship dived. When dived, all Oblivion cannons are retracted and the Tempest cannot construct units, unlike the Atlantis, Fatboy or Megalith, which construct air, land and land respectively, though Fatboys and Megaliths would refuse to build any non-amphibious units if the water is too deep for them to handle.

The unit is also capable of being upgraded with an over-shield and improved structural fields, though it will still mutually annihilate a similarly upgraded (and much cheaper) UEF Summit-class battleship, as long as it has no firepower-oriented upgrades i.e. loaded combat units, secondary Medium Oblivion Cannons (the aforementioned guns that are the same as an Omen Class's), etc. However, even with full upgrades and fully loaded with Serenity-class T3 Mobile Artillery units, the ship can, as long as it remains surfaced, be defeated by Summits cost-effectively. In shorter terms, when you see a Summit, DIVE! Summit-class ships have NO Torpedo defence or torpedoes!

Though the Tempest has excellent Radar and Sonar coverage, please be aware of the fact that it has no Omni and can therefore be ambushed by any unit capable of even temporary cloaking i.e. an SCU or ACU upgraded with Nanite Torpedo Launchers, or stealth, i.e. any fleet covered by a Mermaid-class stealth boat or Flood-class T3 Sonar's stealth field.

END OF CIVILIAN ARCHIVE, FOR COST, STRUCTURAL FIELD STRENGTH, BUILD TIME, ETC. PLEASE SEE MILITARY ARCHIVES, THEY CAN BE REQUISITIONED BY ALL COALITION OFFICERS AT CENTRAL GATE COMPLEXES ON EACH PLANET.

* * *

The Tempests were met with a fleet of Summit-class vessels as well as an Atlantis-class Carrier, all escorted by a fleet of Governor-class cruisers, Cooper-class Torpedo boats and Valiant-class Destroyers, with their own Bulwarks protecting them. The Tempests and Yathsous immediately submerged while the Sirens began evasive manoeuvres and turned back to high-tail it out of there, only five being sunk by the initial volley from the three battleships (were it not for evasive movements, nine would have gone down from the twenty-seven four-kiloton-yield shells in each volley) a Yathsou hunter group surged ahead and eliminated the Bulwarks from inside their shields, and eliminated the Cooper-class torpedo boats with mass fire, they were then forced to retreat by the overwhelming numbers of Stork-class torpedo bombers, at least forty, released by the Atlantis, which had surfaced and begun spewing the aircraft out.

"Geminis and Restorers incoming, just hang on, Rhiza." Dostya announced before a small swarm of tall isosceles triangles and inverted trapezoids moved into the scene, representing nearly a hundred aircraft in total.

"We have incoming fighters, Dostya, be warned, pull your aircraft back while I deal with those cruisers."

"No problem, I'll send out two of my Plan B's to assist…" Launching Loa Tactical Missiles, of reduced yield compared to the forty kiloton directed blasts of the TML-4's Loa Missiles (only sixteen kilotons each), but still five times as damaging as the individual missiles of a Torrent Missile Ship or Viper Mobile Missile Launcher (which were 2.5 kilotons each), the Plan B was an excellent Boomer, considering it also did Strategic Missiles and could hold up to three of those ten-megaton directed blast weapons (modern ACUs and SCUs, along with Galactic Colossi and Megaliths, could easily withstand that amount of power, using hardened fields to greatly reduce the short-duration high-output damage to themselves, though normal strategic nukes had a 50-50 chance of a one-shot kill with their 35-megaton directed blasts). It was also the only available Boomer to have an optional Personal Stealth field and to by default possess powerful torpedo launchers, though it was also the least durable.

Though the missile defence systems on the enemy fleet could take down the primary warhead, the secondary warheads each Loa carries were simply too much for the TMDs to shoot down, so each Loa would do at least three fractions times two kilotons each equals 6 kilotons even against targets protected by TMD. The Governor-class cruisers went down pretty quickly, though Dostya could not send in her wings of Cormorant-class Torpedo Bombers due to the sudden dogfight her Geminis had gotten tied up in with the Wasps from the Atlantis and additional fighter groups from the north, instead, she was forced to send in her small wing of Solace-class Aeon T3 Heavy Torpedo Bombers instead, true, they did more damage and were a lot tougher to the meagre flak the Destroyers and Battleships put up as they retreated from the overwhelming torpedoes coming from above and below.

In and over the northern sea, the battle was going a lot worse; one of Dostya's Soul Rippers crashed into the sea after its Restorer escorts (and Athanahs it had picked up) failed to screen it from the swarm of angry Wasp Air-Superiority Fighters. Angrily, the Restorers hunted down the offending Wasps with the help of Siren-class cruisers, which, since their Nanodarts were no longer turned toward their surface (their alternate firing option), were, along with their Salem-class destroyer escorts, were overrun by Valiant-class destroyers and Cooper-class torpedo boats. Fortunately, the second Soul Ripper took the lone Atlantis-class carrier on the ExoGeni side, via Air Crash, with it to Davy Jones' Locker. Its immense bulk helped smash the Atlantis's weakened structural fields, damaged by Yathsou Sub Hunters, and take the ship with it to the bottom of the Sea, buckling in half as hundreds of thousands of tons came smashing down on it.

This tipped the battle… in the favour of the ExoGeni side, their Summit-class Battleships successfully taking down Dostya's Galaxy-class Battlecruisers (A/N: In-game, they're a type of battleship, but they have torpedoes, like the Neptune-class BC and are not as good as the other Battleships, so they were later moved to Battlecruiser classification) considering the Soul Rippers were no longer methodically sinking them as they emerged onto the battlefield. The fleet of the ExoGeni side then advanced toward Dostya's base, following the fleeing Salem and Siren-class vessels. They were not challenged until they ran into effectively a stockade of HARMS Torpedo Ambush Arrays that cut down the destroyers and torpedo boats before they could react. The arrays only fired once they came in sight range, so as to maintain the aspect of surprise, in the end, the remains of the ExoGeni fleet was sent to the bottom, breaking up as they took far too many Nanite Torpedoes for the fields and hulls to withstand. Dostya breathed a sigh of relief, the ExoGeni bastards would never get to their backup quantum gate, now behind the Coalition lines, at this rate. It had taken a surprise drop of several transports of Fire Beetle Mobile Bombs and Mercy Flying Bombs (Cybran and Aeon T2 units respectively) to eliminate the primary gate before any of the Executives' trucks could get to it.

"We're here, guys, need some help?" Hannah Shepard and Ariel Williams had arrived to help break the back of ExoGeni's line, Dostya and Rhiza had gotten much use out of the rear mass deposits, but they just didn't have enough attention to do everything at once to overwhelm ExoGeni. They gladly turned the Extractors over to the two new arrivals along with Engineers, who immediately set about working. The Paragon attempts by Dostya and Rhiza had fallen flat on their faces due to overwhelming Ambassador Strategic Bomber strikes against every attempt, which was why ExoGeni had yet to be overrun. Also, Dostya and Rhiza were constantly fending off transported units attempting to surprise them and trying to wreak havoc, so they didn't have much attention to devote to actual offence.

"Let's CZAR them, shall we?" Hannah asked Ariel.

"Yeah, you do that; I'll deal with the defences, they need beefing."

"We'll keep them off the defences while you build them, Grand Crusader." Rhiza said, Dostya nodded, before the channel cut out.

The first sign that something was amiss for ExoGeni was when Mavor fire began to rain down on their west coast torpedo defences. Immediately reacting to the threat, several dozen Percival Armoured Assault Bots along with several Fatboys were moved over to await an amphibious assault. However, it was not to be, as a fleet of Plan B's coordinated their Tactical Missile fire on the Torpedo defences in the east, firing simultaneously, taking them out with some assistance from the Tempests. After thoroughly rampaging through the shipyards there, Hannah and Rhiza's fleet turned away and left, expecting an air drop, since sonar had detected no underwater land units en route, nor ships, the ExoGeni side sent a wing of wasp ASFs to intercept the incoming air unit signals, which abruptly peeled away upon noticing the ASFs.

The first Wasp abruptly disappeared in a cloud of Flak a moment later as a fleet of Overlord-class T3 Sea Transports hit the beaches, offloading dozens of Brick Armoured Assault Bots, Loyalist Siege Assault Bots (for defence against Tactical Missiles), Serenity T3 Mobile Heavy Artillery units, and of course the Deceivers that made the stealthy amphibious attack possible. Athanahs, Ascendants, and Riptides had surrounded the ships in close formation, and so they fanned out away from the limited stealth fields to advance inland. The squadrons of enemy units in the southwest of the ExoGeni area had been tied up by advancing Harbingers and Galactic Colossi supported by other units. The western force had hardly moved before waves of Bricks, Harbingers and Loyalists emerged from the waves to challenge them and tie them up, the Sonar and Omni in that area having been eliminated already. The small fleet of Broadswords providing close air support for the ExoGeni forces were no match for the flak guns on the top of each Brick, equivalent to the flak of a Banger T2 Mobile Flak, when they focused fire on individual gunship clusters. The Harbingers provided additional fire support, as they had the same damage rate as Bricks, though less durable and without additional weapons. The Loyalists provided Tactical Missile Defence against the hostile Spearhead T3 Missile Systems, which quickly went up in fireballs as their volleys of Long Range Cruise Missiles were redirected back to the points of origin. The only reason none of the Spearheads dodged was because without visuals on the Coalition units, they had no clue there were Loyalists included, as opposed to say, Othuum Siege Tanks. Those were a much more cost-effective and obvious choice according to the speed the battle group moved at, far lower than the maximum speed of Siege Assault Bots, which (if upgraded with Improved Articulators) would have moved twice as fast, 360 km/h (100 m/s) as opposed to the battle group's 180 km/h (Percivals, unlike upgraded Bricks, moved at a maximum of only 144 km/h)

A hail of shells from numerous Klink Hammer T2 Artillery Installations, Demolisher T3 Mobile Heavy Artillery units, and Fatboys began raining down on the LZ of the units, hammering into the shields of the Parafields that had followed the units underwater (the only Shield Field Generator able to submerge without losing capability other than Command Units and Fatboys). The Parafields held off the initial volley of Artillery Installation shells, and then began to fail one by one, exposing the units under their coverage to enemy fire while they recharged, or in some cases, were destroyed.

A firing line of staggered Parafields, three solid files of Titans, and two ranks of Percivals, firing over the heads of the Titans, which were crouched into Entrench Mode, met the Coalition horde head-on and repelled the first wave of Bricks, Harbingers, Loyalists, and Parafields. The Fatboy and Demolisher support from just behind the line helped greatly, but even they could not do much against the next assault force that was coordinated with the waves of smaller units. Three Megaliths and Two Ythothas began bombarding the line while still moving toward the beachhead, Tempest-class battleships providing artillery support from the waters.

Once one of the Ythothas reached one-half structural integrity, Hannah Shepard manoeuvred her waves of regular units to split in half, charging the now badly damaged Ythotha into the enemy line, which scattered before the experimental, and retreated her own units.

When the 40,000-ton (a Monkeylord is 32000 and a Galactic Colossus 45000 tons) Experimental Assault Bot finally went down, the Othuy Residual Energy Signature that was spawned began unleashing its Unstable Phason Laser on all nearby targets, popping the shields of a Fatboy and annihilating it in under ten seconds. Then it began began work on the other units, the veritable ball of energy floating above the ground as it unleashed its fury. Seraphim scientists had discovered how to contain an Ythotha's core so as to not release an Othuy, but most commanders disabled the control for times when they needed to break the enemy line quickly. The Othuy had very low vision radius, and no radar, so it tended to stay in one place unless it was very, very close to the enemy (or your own, if you're stupid) line, which, in this case, it was.

The tidal wave of Coalition units waited for the Othuy to move aside first before charging through the gaping gap it left in the ExoGeni line. This was almost at the same time as the southern defence line of Ravagers, Triads, Klink Hammers, Air Cleaners, and Flayer SAM Installations collapsed under the fire of Serenity Mobile Heavy Artilleries being micromanaged to evade Klink Hammer fire and fire back accurately. The Mavor Rhiza had put up was a great help in the irritating task, though in the end it still came down to traditional force of arms and a number of Soul Rippers.

* * *

The final fortress of the ExoGeni executives was easier than expected to take down, considering the Coalition side had by this point gotten three Paragons online and were spamming Monkeylords, Megaliths, and Galactic Colossi to do the job. This was in addition to numerous Mavors, on the order of fifteen, providing artillery support.

In the end, the fortified bunkers were captured by Shepard's teleporting ACU before they could set off the self-destruct, the final defence line of Titans completely shattered by a certain Commander's Heavy Microwave Laser, and Ahwassas taking down all other defences that could possibly pose a threat to her. The executives were in for a long, LONG interrogation, and most likely AI implantation and data extraction if they were uncooperative.

"You gotta wonder why they resisted arrest in such an irritating manner… Dostya?" Rhiza asked her Cybran counterpart once the pause got uncomfortably long.

"Well, we will see, won't we? Shepard's still as reckless as I remember her being… and Williams is still as much of a professional turtler."

"True, true, I just hope the interrogations actually reveal some useful information about who the hell backed ExoGeni up and got them all those ACUs we had to annihilate." Said ACUs had been pounded into the ground by Ahwassas, Mavors, Megaliths, Fatboys, or some combination thereof.

"That would be nice, but it had better not be remnants of the Order or the Seven Hand acting up again." Shepard entered the conversation.

"Planning another glassing, Hannah?" Williams also butted in.

"Yes, if they still refuse to surrender like they did last time."

"Are you expecting them to resist the offer of surrender?"

"Yes, especially if they 'resent' us taking down one of their largest front companies. ExoGeni literally had hundreds of billions of credits in assets and net worth." Dostya answered instead of Hannah "Great minds think alike, eh, Shepard?"

"Yep, was just thinking that." Hannah confirmed it.

"I hope you won't be too through in the job, we actually want the area to be reasonably easy to re-terraform, and we already have a monument to your skills on Seraphim IV…" Williams was referring to the two-hundred-kilometre long, fifty-some kilometre wide pool of now cold but still shiny glass that marked the place of last true stronghold of the Order of the Illuminate. It had been completely levelled by massed use of Stonager, Liberator, Apocalypse and Yolona Oss strategic missile launchers. In more recent years, the same number of nukes could have easily created a glass crater more than ten times the size; such was the rate of progress.

"Yeah, don't worry…" Hannah said dismissively, watching the executives be picked up and herded out by the Marines that had just been dropped off, then getting driven to the secondary Quantum Gate by truck. They would be sent off to Coalition HQ for interrogations, while the four would gate out after someone gated in to secure the area, probably an SCU pilot…

"Whatever…" Williams gave up. "Let's get that data we captured back to Coalition and our factional HQs so that they can deal with it… By the way, you know Ash met up with John again?"

"Yeah, John did say something about running into her and picking her up for his Spectre Team on Eden Prime during the attack, too bad we couldn't gate in, the Quantum Realm seems to be having its own El Nino this year doesn't it?"

"I'd say that sounds quite plausible, Hannah, by the way, how's John dealing with his new job as a Spectre?"

"He's doing alright, I'd say, but I really do NOT like how the Coalition basically handed him over to the Council for no reason other than to improve relations. We don't really need great relations with the Council; we just need to ensure no wars occur. It's been proven that we can overrun them with naval power and Commanders with near-ridiculous ease, and we can bulk up our fleets much faster. Besides, the Turians are going to resent us anyways, because we kicked them off the top dog place in terms of military. The only reason they didn't try unlimited war, in which we could have exterminated them within half a decade at most, is because we didn't abuse any civilians or level any cities like they did to us."

"I think they might be trying something behind the scenes though, something immensely stupid that will make sure we take measures to ensure they never become a threat again, like they did to the Krogan after only three colonies. Can you believe that? Neutering an entire race over three colonies, what's the point?" Williams waved her arms in the air to emphasize as the millions of terabytes of data took its sweet time transferring.

"Relax, Ariel, they're not nearly as war-hardened as we are, they sure weren't back then, even though they started the war with a pre-emptive strike that took out hundreds of Krogan cites, orbital stations, outposts and even planets, they couldn't accept that they themselves would take losses. That's why they did what they did; it was like the Earth Empire trying to wipe out the Seraphim back before the rise of the Aeon. They need punishing, but we are not the ones to do it to them unless they provoke us. Besides, they do not yet really understand our technologies or our true power, so they have effectively no chance of defeating us even if they brought out all of their reserves."

"True, True, Hannah, now… the transfer's finished, and the investigative teams have arrived, let's go"

"I agree, I'm getting sick of this operations area." It was one of the downsides of Seton's Clutch being such a frequent location of battles during the Infinite War, every commander had spent at least some simulator time on the scenario.

* * *

A/N: A Tom Clancy quote was included, one from the book _Executive Orders_, who can spot it?

Also, I know it's a bit ridiculous for ExoGeni to have so much machinery and six ACUs, but it will be revealed later why this is so; you just have to wait a bit.


	19. The Confessor Cabal

A/N: Title is a reference to Command & Conquer 3 Kane's Wrath as the Black Hand are the most badass faction in that game (followed by the Steel Talons, then Reaper-17, though ST's lack of Sonic weapons and higher-level infantry isn't great considering it's made for mechanized warfare, and Reaper-17 is air-less, Scrin almost NEED air support, unlike GDI or Nod)

Once they have the Black Disciples and Purifying flame upgrades, the Black Hand's Militant Rocket Squads become absurd, two anti-tank/anti-air missile troops with a very tough flamethrower guy. Can deal with air, vehicle, infantry, and even clear garrisons… combine it with Steel Talons' ability to put someone in a Behemoth (artillery walker) and their ERT (Emergency Repair Transport i.e. weapon-less APC with repair abilities) and you have one of the greatest assault platforms and forces in history, Mammoth Tanks with the reactive plating or whatever it's called (and Railguns) is just frosting on the cake (Though Titans have better manoeuvrability and should be used instead in winding terrain).

But this is not a crossover with that, don't worry, though Confessor Cabals with upgrades are the best anti-infantry basic and medium infantry ever (even better than Buzzers, Ravagers or Grenadiers).

FOR THE RECORD (AND TALI-SHIPPERS): There is a reason James Shepard exists, need I say more?

Also, on the ACU-issue Da-Readin'-Guy mentioned, you'll just have to wait and see, I can tell you this though: SCUs are like before, but ACUs are more like SupCom 2 ACUs in durability (the death nuke is still like SupCom 1 though). As for the upgrades, wait and see.

* * *

Chapter 19: The Confessor Cabal

_Sometime in early July, Normandy, Location: Undisclosed_

"Life is going as usual on the good ship Normandy, isn't it, Kaidan?" Joker asked casually, looking sideways from his helm station.

"As you know very well, no news is often the best news."

"Oh come on, Alenko, don't you want to get something done in life? A little excitement or adventure never hurt."

"Oh yeah, like the excitement of you trying to walk without help and having your legs shatter under your weight."

"Low blow, Alenko, low blow…" After a long, comfortable pause, Joker abruptly started again "Have you heard the latest scuttlebutt that's going around?"

"Which piece?"

"The Commander and the Doctor" Joker looked at the man again.

"No way, you mean Shepard and Chakwas?" Joker facepalmed after Alenko had gotten through with the sentence.

"No, I'm talking about our resident Prothean Expert, you know, blue skin, great body, cute face, sexy voice?"

"Sexy voice? Are you sure?" Kaidan raised an eyebrow "I never detected anything noticeable about her voice…"

"It only happens when she talks to Shepard, she's probably head over heels for the guy… they're so cute together…" Joker sighed dreamily.

"Uh, Joker? Joker! JOKER!" Kaidan was wind-milling his arms in front of Joker's face when he abruptly got shooed aside.

"Alenko, it's called dramatizing, acting, etc., haven't you ever heard of it?" Joker rolled his eyes. "Have you noticed the way Shepard acts around her? All the looks he gives her when he thinks she's not looking? I see a Cybran in love…"

"And I see a UEF who needs a friendly Aeon to remind him that said Cybran's business has nothing to do with him, so he should stop prying." Kaidan cracked his knuckles ominously.

"Don't try anything, Alenko, or I'll leak you and Williams' thing to the rest of the ship!" Joker said, grinning maniacally.

Kaidan's jaw dropped open and one of his eyebrows shot up almost comically "What thing?"

"Don't tell me anything, I've seen it all from the mission footage, your vision is centered on Williams way too often, though I must say you're pretty gentlemanly considering you mostly look at her eyes, other than the times when you're asked to 'watch her ass' or cover said ass, in which case…" Joker suddenly realized that blackmail would do him no good if Kaidan's biotics tore him apart before he could reap the rewards. "Shutting up now."

"Good." Kaidan's corona faded. "Now tell me, what happens to Liara around Shepard? Or Ashley around me?"

"You're actually interested in Ashley and… never mind," Joker said, raising his hands in surrender as Kaidan glowed blue again. "Anyways, Ashley has about the same sort of problem you do, but in her case it's for much shorter durations and appear to be an entirely unconscious action, I think you'd go well together. Liara seems to fixate on Shepard when he is near, and she talks differently around him, slightly more nervous and awkward than usual." Joker stopped for a moment "Kaidan, a word of advice, don't let an opportunity like Ashley pass you by, got it?"

After a long moment of silence and stillness, during which Joker absently wondered if he'd accidentally killed the Lieutenant, Kaidan spoke "I'll consider it."

"Good, that's all I can ask of you, Kaidan, now, when do you think Shepard and Liara will confess to each other?"

"Probably very soon, I'd say within the next twenty-four hours."

"Hmm… how much do you want to bet? And no cheating allowed, Alenko" Joker wagged a finger at the Lieutenant.

"Well, I'll bet…"

* * *

_Twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes after bet, Normandy, Location: Undisclosed_

_Should I tell him?_ Liara mentally asked herself while chatting away with Shepard regarding the Coalition's history with biotics, sitting in her quarters. _We haven't known each other all that long, but these feelings have only grown stronger by the day, I should tell him, it would be rude not to let him know._

"Is there anything else you'd like to talk about, Liara? Liara?" John frowned slightly at Liara's current zoned-out state, it was worrying

"Huh? Oh, I am sorry, Shepard, there is something I was going to tell you from that time before the Seven Hand… I'm not sure if I should say it…"

"Liara, you know you can tell me anything, though I hope you aren't going to spontaneously come up with something like 'I work for Saren' just to tease me." Shepard grinned, though said grin quickly vanished when Liara's face took on a horrified expression.

"Oh no, Shepard, It's nothing like that!" She was about to continue when Shepard cut her off.

"It was a joke, Liara, now, what were you going to say?" John had an ominous feeling that it would be monumental news, much like the news of First Contact with the Turians, or rather, the Relay 282 Incident.

"I had looked up you history to find out what made you into the man you are, I wanted to understand you, there was something strangely compelling about you, Shepard…" Liara trailed off, looking for a reaction.

"'Was'?" Joker, listening in through the suit comms that Shepard had forgotten to turn off, facepalmed, typical of him to catch onto the least important part of that. "Are you sure you're interested in me? Or is it my visions of the Protheans?"

Liara shifted from side to side as she began to speak "I admit, your connection to the Protheans had something to do with my initial interest," a brief nod later "but it has grown beyond that… you intrigue me, Shepard, but I was not sure if it was appropriate to act on my feelings." By this point, Shepard, and by proxy Kaidan and Joker were hanging onto the Asari's every word. "I thought there might already be a relationship between you and Chief Williams." Joker was laughing his ass off in the bridge, Kaidan had his jaw down to the next deck, and Shepard raised an eyebrow.

Shepard told her the truth behind himself and Ashley "I've known Ash since I was… I think about two months old, we're best friends, and we have been for all our lives, not counting James, but we're just friends, nothing more."

"My mistake then, I am not as adept at understanding human relationships as I thought, the extranet taught me a lot about your species, but it seems that like Asari, it is easy to confuse close friendship and a relationship… But what about us, Shepard? Is there a mutual attraction? Or was I wrong about that, too?"

"No, you were right… there is something between us, something… inexplicable." Shepard's brain was throwing a celebration complete with confetti at this wonderful revelation, she had feelings for him! He realized he was probably grinning like an idiot but found he didn't care whatsoever.

Liara almost bounced on her feet with joy "I knew it! And I knew you felt it too. But, does this not seem rather strange? Why do I feel so close to you? We have only known each other a short time. We are from two different species. We have almost nothing in common. This makes no sense!" She appeared troubled.

Shepard got the feeling it was up to him to be a fire brigade to Liara's rapidly spreading doubts of her own confession. "These things never make sense. They just happen, and we get swept up in the storm."

"You make it sound so chaotic," Liara looked down at the deck for a moment "so… dangerous."

"I'll keep you safe" Shepard immediately regretted his choice of words; it sounded belittling of her own abilities to protect herself, when she'd more than proven her abilities in battle.

"I am not looking for a protector" Shepard realized he was right to regret his diction. "This is all a bit overwhelming. I am not used to… this. You. I need some time."

"Take all the time you need, Liara, I'll be here." It was the only thing he could say under the circumstances.

"Thank you, Shepard, let's… let's just talk about something else for now."

"Okay, Liara, let's talk about your research, why did the universities refuse to acknowledge your findings as accurate? They made sense, didn't they?"

"Well, it can all be said by the response I got from the Serrice University on Thessia" Shepard nodded; it was the Asari homeworld they were talking about. "'We find you findings hard to believe and not backed by sufficient years in the field or sufficient evidence'"

"Fifty years in the field is insufficient?" Shepard was incredulous.

"By Asari standards, fifty years is an absurdly short time for such a monumental hypothesis…" The exchange went on, with the participants finally in the clear about each other's feelings, but still avoiding the topic.

* * *

"I can't believe it; they actually went ahead and did it." Joker said, slightly shell-shocked after realization as to what had happened set in.

"So, Joker, you win, by one minute, according to when they actually confessed, what do I have to do?"

"Well, first you need to tell me what you would have made me do…"

"I would have asked you to romance Chakwas until she agreed to marry you and have your babies, probably."

Joker looked pensive for a moment "I don't think so, I think Gardner has a bit of a thing for her, they're both around the same age, seventy or so years, still young." Human average life expectancy was something around 350 to 450 years, so they were effectively only 20% through their lifespan. "Though they're considered old because of the Wars." The Infinite War and Seraphim War had made maximum life expectancy more along the lines of 150, with few people in the Coalition of any species other than Drell currently over 100 years old, as old people were last to be evacuated, normally. Childbearing age had still not recovered from the wars, still hovering around fifty as an average, though most young people were shifting toward the hundred-year-mark from the twenty-five that had been the average during the wars.

"Never thought of that, so what do I have to do?"

"Confess to Ashley." Joker was very matter-of-fact about it.

"You're joking."

"Uh, no" Joker wagged a finger teasingly.

"Dammit… oh, uh, hello, Commander."

Joker's head whipped around so fast he shocked himself with the fact that it didn't break "Commander? Where? Oh, uh, hi, Shepard, we were just talking." He smiled a guilty-as-sin innocent smile at Shepard, who was tapping his foot on the deck, arms crossed in front of his chest in a classic pose of irritation.

"You bet on me and Liara's confession." Shepard deadpanned; he had wandered into the bridge, still thinking about Liara's words, when he'd overheard the two talking.

"Er, in a way, uh, sort of… okay, yes, Shepard, we did bet on you and Liara's confession, Kaidan lost." Joker pointed a finger at Kaidan as if to distract Shepard's sure-to-come wrath.

"And now you had to force him to go confess to Ashley, right?"

"Yes, Commander." Kaidan reported.

"You're pathetic, Alenko, you know that? It takes a bet to force you to go confess to Ash? As her childhood best friend I'm not sure you even deserve her!" Shepard fake-snarled, internally laughing as both of the other men cringed.

"Yes, Sir, I'm sorry, Sir." Kaidan replied in a small voice.

"Ugh, I didn't exactly mean it like that, Alenko, I meant if I kept putting you two together in the SCU or Restorer or in missions how the hell did it take so long for you to realize you had feelings for her? Or for her to realize she has feelings for you? Knowing Ash, she wouldn't beat around the bush on this sort of thing… now get your ass over there, you have a confession to make." Shepard gave Kaidan a healthy shove in the direction of the door to the bridge after dragging him to a standing position from his seat.

* * *

After Kaidan knocked on her door and Ashley opened it for him, her computer console squawked again. "By the way, Ash, you know that Lieutenant you serve with, Kaidan Alenko? We saw you and John with him on the news… he's cute! Later sis." Sarah hung up the vid-call before Ashley could do an about-face and give her usual retort of "regulations".

"Uh, hi Ash." Kaidan fidgeted, mentally cursing Joker for persuading him to do this, and himself for making the bet.

"Please tell me you did not hear that…" She shook her head resignedly.

"It's good to see you're keeping in touch with your family, most children drift away from their families with time." Kaidan babbled, looking for something to talk about rather than feelings.

"Well, mom was often out on missions and Dad was doing work at the local marine garrison most of the time, so I kinda helped raise my sisters."

"How many sisters do you have?" Kaidan was intrigued, he himself did not have any siblings.

"Three, Abby, Lynn and Sarah, I'm the oldest. Abby's married already, Lynn… I wasn't as close to her as Sarah, she was the one I felt closest to, and she was the one vid-calling me just now."

"I wish I had siblings, but…" Kaidan shook his head "Ash, can we talk?"

"Sure, LT, what do you want to talk about? Is something wrong with my combat performance or conduct?" She frowned.

"No, it's just that… over the last few missions, I've been affecting your performance, I'm sorry" Kaidan had no clue where his mouth was going but he knew what a hole sounded like when you were digging one, and he was dimly cursing whoever scripted this incredibly lame speech.

"I don't know what you're talking about, LT." Ashley was similarly wondering who the hell scripted THAT line.

"Joker told me, he showed me your camera footage, with eye-tracking." Ashley paled at this revelation "I've become aware that like my own behaviour, you are slightly… distracted when I'm around."

"LT, if it's about that—wait, what do you mean 'like my own behaviour'?"

"Well, Ash, I've been looking at and thinking about you a bit too much to be healthy, and… I think… there might be something between us." Up in the bridge, Joker was dropping his head on a desk repeatedly at the sheer lameness of this confession and typicality when compared to the "smooth" transition (which was about as lumpy as a pile of boulders) that occurred with Liara and Shepard. "The question is, do you feel it too?"

"Kaidan… I… I don't know, there's regulations, Kaidan, we're not supposed to fraternize, especially between ranks, I mean, Gabby and Ken down in engineering would make a wonderful couple since they're the same rank, but they'll never realize it. Adams wants them to figure it out on their own, Tali probably doesn't even notice, and Shepard's thinking the same as Adams."

"Ash, listen to me for a moment, just a moment, the regs also say that stable relationships are in fact desirable on ships considering the small crews of Coalition ships, more stability for crew members and less of a sense of loneliness." Kaidan took a small, hesitant step forward. Ashley took a large step back.

"But how do we know this could turn out to be anything remotely stable? Regs strongly discourage any and all flings aboard starships; break-ups can severely affect efficiency in such small crews." Ashley could feel her resistance starting to fracture as she grew increasingly irritated at her own babbling.

"Ashley, no one ever knows what exactly will happen, these things just are, and we get swept up in them." Kaidan felt really pathetic borrowing the Commander's lines, back on the bridge, Joker was laughing over Kaidan's improvisation while Shepard noted with pride that he was apparently proficient enough at talking with women to be emulated

"Well, okay, Kaidan, to be honest to the Way, I do feel attracted to you, but… I need some time to think about it."

"I'll give you all the time you need, Ashley; I should probably go before someone gets suspicious."

"You mean someone like Joker and his mutated, monstrous rumour mill? What are they gonna come up with, us having a one-night-stand?"

"In a word, yes" Kaidan deadpanned.

"Okay then, goodbye, Kaidan, I hope we're together for the next mission!"

"I do too, later, Ash." Kaidan then left, breathing a sigh of relief as the door closed and sealed behind him, then jumped, pumping his fist in the air in celebration at not being shot down, according to Shepard, Ashley had a reputation for being a T3 Flayer SAM installation when it came to shooting down men. Though the Flayer (UEF) was no longer in common use, as the Myrmidon (Cybran) had better firing rate and effectiveness against small targets, and the Transcender (Aeon) was more efficient at cutting down large targets, it was still used on Atlantis Carriers and Governor-class Cruisers, and could be quite deadly.

"Kaidan, for the record, with your lameness, I'm shocked she accepted your confession." Joker said.

"Ignore his words, Lieutenant, you did well out there, now, I hope the next mission comes along soon, then you'll have the choice of staying on the Normandy, Restorer or SCU with her, or coming groundside with her."

"Uh, I recommend you ask her what she thinks, not me."

"Already whipped, Kaidan?" Joker teased.

"Joker, it's not called whipped, it's perfectly normal when dealing with Aeon women, they tend to be dominating in everything except on occasion sex."

"Is that from experience, Shepard? Aren't you a bit young? You're only what, nineteen and a half?" Kaidan asked.

"Wait, Commander, you're not twenty yet? You look older though."

"Cybrans age faster in their early years, and then it slows down to a pace more like the Aeon aging process of that age. So yeah, I am chronologically nineteen, but by pre-quantum-age standards I'm physically and mentally twenty-five or so."

"That's still pretty young for your rank."

"Mindoir, Akuze and Elysium, plus my grades in the Academy, that's all I can say." The conversation continued from there.

* * *

"Something's definitely wrong with the ship." Shepard muttered darkly, standing next to Wrex, who was currently playing a remake of Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath due to excessive boredom. "So many people are confessing, Gardner even confessed to Chakwas, the only people with a partner who haven't confessed are Ken and Gabby."

"Perhaps the ship has been infiltrated, Shepard." The Krogan rumbled. "By one of these" he pointed his left hand at the screen, Shepard facepalmed, Wrex had selected a Confessor Cabal, the basic infantry unit of the Black Hand subfaction of the Brotherhood of Nod; the unit was upgraded with Black Disciple, Purifying Flame, and Tiberium Infusion.

"Wrex… that's just… never mind, see you later." The ship trembled slightly as Shepard left.

Joker came over the PA, stating "we are sorry for the turbulence due to excessive laughter on the part of this pilot at the joke Wrex has just sprung, especially considering it was on Commander Shepard, please remain clam and at your stations, thank you."

When the elevator opened up at the Quarters deck, Shepard came face-to-face with a fidgeting Liara. "What did Wrex do to you?" was the first thing that came out of the Asari's mouth as she looked Shepard up and down worriedly.

"Relax, Liara, he just used a really lame and really appropriate video game reference."

"Oh… Okay I guess, what was the reference?"

"Why don't I show you?"

"What's the name of the game?"

* * *

"So Wrex suggested that these warrior-priests of the fictional Brotherhood of Nod, called Confessors, came onboard, and since you're supposed to confess to them, everyone promptly began confessing their feelings more or less simultaneously for everyone else?" Liara said flatly.

"Ah, yes, that's kind of the point."

"I'd say it's very plausible, though I suspect they only targeted Wrex with a hallucinogenic grenade that made him think we were all confessing to these 'Confessors'." Liara stated, causing Shepard to begin laughing. "Also, there are six Confessors in a Confessor Cabal, yes?"

"True, though if you upgrade them with Black Disciple you add one Black Hand trooper to make a squad of seven." Shepard was wondering what other joke Liara would make out of that.

"Ah yes, and how many people confessed to each other their feelings in the past couple days?" Liara asked dryly, tilting her head at Shepard.

"There are us, Kaidan and Ash, Chakwas and Gardner, that's six."

"Exactly, since six people were confessed to, Wrex must have hallucinated that there were six Confessors, hence, a full Confessor Cabal."

Shepard stared, slack-jawed "Liara, you should go give Joker a few pointers to make him use decent jokes, not the half-assed ones he comes up with on his own."

"Thanks, Shepard, I'll consider it." Liara smiled her newest attempt at a joke or perhaps a logic bomb had, surprisingly, NOT fallen flat on its face.

"Shepard, we've reached the Asgard System, and are being hailed by Terra Nova, they're detecting an asteroid on collision course with the planet, the estimated time to impact is four hours, and the colony doesn't have… a Quantum Gate or Orbital Gate? That's bullshit! The Coalition would never allow that to happen to a colony! Why can't they gate in commanders from elsewhere and Yolona Oss the asteroid to oblivion?" Joker exclaimed over the PA, interrupting the moment of extremely comfortable silence between Shepard and Liara.

"Much regret… unable… destruction of Orbital Gate… too much Quantum Wake to gate in… for the next five hours" The quantum message was static-riddled by still understandable.

"Alright, crew, suit up, we're going in to either get rid of or divert this asteroid." Shepard left Liara to suit up with a quick "Goodbye, Liara."

"Goodbye, Shepard." She replied, finishing the fixings of the flank pieces, which connected the chest and back pieces to form the torso piece.

"Don't you mean 'Let's go save the world', Commander?" Joker put in his own two cents, while Shepard watched Liara's door cycle closed.

"Yeah, well, whatever the hell's going on with that asteroid, and whatever we're doing according to Joker, we're going in." Shepard said over the squad comms.

"Are we taking the Rhino or Restorer?" Garrus asked, mandibles clicking.

"We're taking the Rhino down. Ashley, Kaidan, fly support with the Restorer."

"Why not bring the SCU and use the Light Chronotron Overcharge Cannon whenever we need heavy firepower on the order of ninety kilotons?" Unfortunately due to the short duration of the blast of Overcharge pulses (any longer and they'd be one-shot weapons), they were relatively ineffective against structural fields or shields, but against asteroids, it was an entirely different matter.

Shepard shook his head at Wrex' suggestion "Wrex, we'll use it as a last resort, if we can't find another way, but first I want to see if we can get those civilians mentioned in the data packet out. No more innocents need to die from terrorist attacks this day."

"Okay, Shepard, if you say so…" Wrex shrugged his armoured shoulders, accidentally banging one of his arm towers into Liara's shoulder pauldron from above. "Oops, sorry, Liara" She'd earned his respect a long time ago, hence, the use of the first name. "Hey, Turian brick, could you hurry it up?" He only called the other guy Garrus when in combat, outside, it was just "Turian" still, and probably would always remain so, considering what the Turians had done to the Krogan.

"Well, not my fault I…"

CLANG!

"Ow." Garrus was irritated at the extremely blocky design of the UEF Heavy armour, with the very recessed helmet and enormous shoulder plates that helped house the weapons so that they would not be disabled during combat by enemy fire. He'd managed to bang his shoulders on the most inopportune places in the Rhino, slowing the procession down a little, supremely irritating and a cause for Wrex to annoy him.

"Uh, as a matter of fact, it was your fault, you chose the UEF Heavy Armour." Wrex did the Krogan equivalent of an innocent smile when Garrus turned his armour so he could stare Wrex in the eye, neither was wearing their helmets. Shepard's professional opinion was that Krogan could not pull off an innocent smile if their lives depended on it.

"Wrex, I think we should concentrate on preparing for drop, shouldn't we?" The Marine seats were each wide enough to fit two normal humans side by side and very comfortable for the armoured beings. Shepard checked everyone's crash harnesses before announcing "Joker, begin the transfer to the Restorer."

Once again, the 400-some ton tank (additional weight due to more upgrades being applied) effectively flipped over and was ejected through the cargo bay doors, latching onto the bottom of the Restorer's hull, which then moved "up" relative to itself. The gunship peeled away from the Normandy without further incident and began hunting for a suitable LZ near the first fusion torch, quickly locating one just over a rise from the torch to avoid any local heavy anti-ground firepower and swooping in low along the terrain before abruptly stopping, dropping the tank off, and flying off again at a little over Mach 1.3.

* * *

A/N: I know this is ludicrously short compared to my usual 6500-12000 word boundaries, but I'm not good at writing romance (might decide to come back and rewrite this later, a LOT later) so I'm moving on to the action parts, also, I'm sorry I didn't show much in the way of Ashley-Kaidan interaction, but this fic is as I said action-centered, I'll not be spending too much time on pairings not critical to the plot. Liara-Shepard only gets as much attention as it does as it's plot-critical, Ash-Kaidan will get more time the closer we get to Virmire… I hope.

By the way, Ash didn't resist Kaidan's advances much because she felt something was there, and the Way demands you be true to yourself. (Or rather, I decided to take the easy way out with Aeon romances, heh)

By the way, there's a reason Seth-Thauum isn't heard from very often anymore, it has to do with Supreme Commander: The Koprulu Sector.


	20. Bringing Down The Sky

Chapter 20: Bringing Down the Sky

The occupants of the Rhino and Restorer alike felt absolutely no acceleration or deceleration from the motions of the two craft. The Restorer had slowed down over the ground from 1440 km/h to a stop in under two seconds and the Rhino dropped twenty meters straight down before the gunship flew off again with similar acceleration. The tank's treads were already in motion less than half a second after the tank hit the ground, the half-second being the safety period so that the fields would not be damaged by rapidly churning of debris.

"Commander, we just got a transmission, apparently someone is using the three fusion torches to direct the asteroid toward Terra Nova, the technicians on the ground are begging you to shut down the fusion torches before it's too late. The woman who sent it sounded like she was in hiding." Joker told them.

"Understood, Joker, keep an eye out for fleeing civilians or terrorists, Shepard Out."

The Rhino rolled toward the first fusion torch quickly, practically flying over the rise before it landed again on the ground with a soft thump, smashing one rocket turret into the ground and churning it to bits under the tank's mighty treads as the three Particle Cannons ripped into another one near the other end of the torch. The Citadel-standard turrets were shredded in but moments by the tank's immense firepower. Their disruptor rockets were easy to evade for the speedy Rhino, which literally ran circles around them or, in the case of the one on the top of the cliff overlooking the site, strafed.

"Shepard, while it is fun to watch you do this, and nice that we don't feel anything noticeable in the way of acceleration and deceleration, can you not spin around so much? It's making me tank-sick…" Garrus said.

"I think you should listen to him, Shepard, we don't want a repeat of the last time you did something stupid i.e. drive this tank through a vertical loop. The mess Garrus left in the Bridge bathroom was NOT pretty." Wrex growled.

"Well, okay, I'll just put your helmet feeds to the strategic view so you won't see everything spinning and get dizzy; it's what I'm doing."

"Why didn't you say this earlier?" Tali demanded.

"Uh, I thought I set all your helmets to do that already… never mind, I only set Liara's, sorry."

"Whatever" Tali rolled her eyes as she sighed in comfort, her helmet displays having switched to show the strategic screen, more or less centered on the tank and zoomed in enough to show the tank's entire vision area, with arrows at the edge of the screen (akin to those found in Command & Conquer 3) designating mission objectives.

Once the turrets were down, the squad set the tank to Guard stance and bailed out, breaching the door to the fusion torch facility with Tali's hacking. They met a group of somewhat startled Batarian Troopers and their pack of varren. Suffice it to say Wrex and Tali made short work of the varren using heavy weapons, Gauss Chaingun and Flamethrower respectively while Garrus, Liara and Shepard laid out the Batarians. When all the enemies were reduced to smoking pieces of meat, Wrex commenting that flamethrower-roasted varren didn't taste as good as he'd expected, they shut down the torch.

Another transmission came through, "This is Kate Bowman, Batarian extremists have attacked us and killed many of us personnel on the asteroid… damn it, they're coming for me!" The transmission abruptly cut out, leaving Shepard and company to exit the torch station, hurrying back toward the Rhino.

A shot rang out and bounced off Shepard's shields an instant before the group readied their weapons, biotics and tech abilities, ready to face a threat from any side, but mostly oriented toward the source of the shot. A trembling human Engineer put his pistol down "I'm sorry, I thought you were Batarians… I'm Simon Atwell, I take it you're Coalition reinforcements?"

"Where are they and what the hell do they plan on doing with this asteroid?"

"They're at the torch stations and the main facility, I don't know why they plan to crash this asteroid into Terra Nova, it'll effectively kill the planet until the Coalition can deploy terraformers to it. The Batarians, they're slavers and pirates, not planet killers…"

"What about Kate Bowman?"

"One of my best engineers, that girl, she and her brother Aaron signed up together, hope she doesn't do anything stupid though…" Simon shook his head sadly.

"Any other useful intel you have for us, Simon?"

"I saw the Batarians deploy live blasting caps around the next closest torch facility, over that way, that's all I can tell you, besides the fact that the Batarian leader is name Balak…"

"Thanks for the Intel, Simon" Shepard switched channels "Williams, Alenko, pick this man up and keep him in the Restorer's cargo bay, no need to call on Chakwas, don't let him near any controls, just in case he's employed by the Batarians…"

Heading north toward the next fusion torch, the Rhino blasted five more rocket turrets to oblivion at long range, the turrets all being the aboveground models as opposed to the ambushing ones, and methodically cleared a path through the blasting caps using the cycling option for its guns, clearing six caps per second with the turret's speedy traverse and pinpoint accuracy of the Particle Cannons. After forging a path (Wrex gave the helpful quote of "'Forge a path!' Trademark of the Avatar Warmech, Command & Conquer 3" during this experience) and clearing out a small number of Batarian troops, the team entered the second fusion torch structure.

The two dozen Batarians inside met the business ends of the team's weapons, excluding Garrus's LBR, which was blowing apart the four Rocket Drones one by one while the automatic weapons chewed through the organic foes like they were wet paper.

During the fighting, while crouched behind cover and firing over it, Wrex was struck with an epiphany "Shepard, how does this Sonic Pulse Shotgun fire slugs faster than Mach 1? And how do the sonic pulse batteries on some Aeon units shoot down aircraft that are moving faster than sound and therefore would disrupt the sonic strike before the pulse gets there?"

"In reality, the sonic pulse is a plasma round that focuses its output directly into the hull or body of the target and sets off a frequency harmonic to cause damage in addition to the plasma damage, that's why they call it a sonic pulse, it's a better-sounding name than Plasma-acoustic strike weapon, or at least shorter and more deceptive-sounding."

"…That was a long explanation, Shepard." Wrex was right; it had been such a long explanation that the crew had killed all the Batarians and drones in the meantime.

"They know someone's shutting down the torches and are going to blow up the main facility" Kate Bowman's voice over the radio sounded panicked while she said it. "Ah!" She squealed in surprise

"Listen, bitch, tell us who the hell's doing this or your brother dies." A Batarian's voice came over the radio, recognizable for its accent.

"Never"

"Alright then" a gunshot and a body hitting the ground could be heard "Charn, find this problem and deal with it."

"Alright, boss, if you say so…" The other Batarian, Charn, said, seemingly resigned to the job. The transmission cut out after that point, Shepard and crew were already flying over the terrain, squashing small hillocks with the Rhino's mass, rushing toward the third torch station and the main facility near it.

After running over the rocket turrets in their way, and toasting several others, the tank came to an abrupt stop outside the last fusion torch, Shepard and crew disembarking seconds later and breaking down the door with a single Nanodart from Wrex's Infantry Nanodart Launcher.

Two dozen Batarian troops greeted them, one of the Shock Troopers immediately catching Tali with a Warp before her dampening pulse could envelop him in return. She screamed as her armour's structural integrity and gravitation fields battled the unstable mass effect fields, and bathed the offending Shock Trooper with a deluge of maddened Phasic Shotgun fire until his brain was vaporized and the Warp died down, after three full seconds. Liara's biotic Barrier had kept the other biotics at bay while Garrus copped them with his Sniper Mode LBR and the other three members used their weapons to great effect. Wrex was trading fire with the five Rocket Troopers present with his Infantry Nanodart Launcher, which fired twice a second as opposed to the opponents' one per four seconds, and Gauss Chaingun, propping both up on his cover to help with the weight of dual-wielding. Shepard was methodically disassembling the Troopers with his LBR and Liara was dual-wielding her SMGs against the hostiles, the Phasic SMG serving duty as a carbine for her more precise strikes while the Laser SMG was used to overwhelm targets with volume of fire.

"A little hand here someone?" Wrex roared into his comm. after being forced to duck behind cover again. "These shoulder towers really get in the way and they make me a really big target!"

"Wrex, they can be used as heavy weapons support points!" Shepard shouted back, the shoulder towers could indeed mount heavy weapons, though the body had to be turned to face the enemy that way.

"You already are a big target, Wrex!" Garrus added jokingly, Wrex facepalmed right after he'd attached the Infantry Nanodart Launcher to the top hard point of one shoulder tower.

"Turian, shut up." Wrex replied, using the flexibility the towers offered him to keep even his hands behind cover while he deployed the weapons to great effect.

"Why?" The Turian nailed another Shock Trooper as he did this.

"Because you're annoying, Garrus, I have a flamethrower…" Tali said in irritation, firing over her cover at the encroaching Batarians, still nursing the bruises the warp had caused.

"Fine…" Garrus sounded like he was sulking. Over on the other side of the room, Shepard and Liara exchanged a look before Shepard facepalmed and Liara looked toward the ceiling, both still firing away via gun cam over their cover.

After the last of the Batarians had become rapidly cooling chunks of meat, the groups stormed upstairs, checking through the rooms as they made a beeline for the torch's controls. After they shut it down, they moved back downstairs, coming face to face with a large group of Batarians, none of them with weapons up. So, Shepard ordered his squad to hold fire with a hand held up.

"Who are you and what do you hope to accomplish by being here?"

"Listen, man, I'm Charn and this was my crew up until a few weeks ago, I hope we can come to a peaceful resolution… I don't know why the top dogs of the Batarian Syndicates sent Balak to replace me as this crew's leader, but they're clearly a bunch of idiots. This was supposed to be a simple slave grab operation but Balak's been planning to destroy Terra Nova instead." The Batarian shook his head, all four eyes closed for a moment "Neither I nor my crew wanted anything to do with the op, but after he had a couple of my underlings executed by his loyalists… I know humans think of us as slavers, but me and my boys, we have principles, and we don't do mass terrorism. I just want me and my crew to get off this rock, I'm tired of his little crusade against humans, and so are the boys here with me, the rest of them, they're Balak's loyalists, they'd follow him no matter what. We're just sacred he'll skin us alive out of spite if we tried to rebel, we might be more skilled than his troops but he's got a lot more of them. How about a deal, human, you get rid of Balak, and we leave this place without causing any trouble?"

"Sounds alright to me, though I must say it's strange for a Batarian to have principles."

"My brothers died fighting for the Syndicates, I'm a lot more cynical than most." Charn shook his head again. "So, it's a deal?"

"Certainly, if you'll just step aside… We'll be on our way, see you!" Shepard's crew simply walked out after the small crowd had parted. "By the way, the name's Shepard, Commander Shepard."

"Good luck with Balak, he can be one mean bastard, here's the pass, Shepard, good luck, though I hear the Lion of Elysium, Sole Survivor of Akuze and First Human Spectre makes his own luck." The two men shared a chuckle before Charn handed Shepard the pass to the asteroid's main facility and shook hands.

"Well, Charn, I hope to see you again sometime, who knows… maybe as a team member?"

"Shepard, let's get moving!" Wrex's gravely voice called.

"Coming, Wrex!" The crew of Batarians followed Shepard outside, where he climbed onto the Rhino.

"That's a pretty big, and pretty sick ride, eh, boss?" One of the Batarians commented while Shepard was climbing into the turret hatch.

"Just one question before you go, Shepard, how did you park your speeder" that was what it looked like "on top of this brick of… whatever this is?"

"Uh, because it's not parked on top?" Shepard said, grinning manically with his helmet lights while making a victory sign with his hand and setting a course for the 400-some ton tank, which accelerated to near its max speed of 240 km/h or just less than 67 m/s in less than two seconds, leaving the Batarians blinking in the dust. "See ya boys!" was the last they heard of Shepard.

One of the other Batarians blinked "boss, I think I just figured out why we lost the Skyllian Blitz so thoroughly."

Charn facepalmed, while another Batarian elbowed the first one and said sarcastically: "Ya think? What was the first clue, the huge-ass tank?"

* * *

"Is it just me, or is that a whole crapload of slag?" Shepard rolled his eyes as the Rhino cut down and/or ran over more turrets, a LOT more turrets. "Come on, guys, let's get out and have some fun, can't let the Rhino do all the work for us, now can we?"

"You got that part right, Shepard" Wrex rumbled as they cycled through the airlocks of the tank and jumped out onto the ground from their bottom-deck airlock, not bothering with the small ladder.

The crew advanced until Shepard held up a hand "Heavy weapons, boys." He said after Tali's Omni Sensor warned them of large numbers of hostiles ahead

Tali drew her flamethrower, Wrex his Gauss Chaingun (the Nanodart Launcher would have been a typical case of overkill), Shepard his Temporal Fizz Launcher, Garrus his Tomcat Autogun, setting it up and getting ready to deploy once he'd rounded the corner, and everyone else drew ULPAs, which were essentially General-Purpose Machine Guns. At a signal—a nod—from Shepard, they flooded into the main room and opened massed fire on the Batarians. The shields of the enemies were whittled down within moments while the team took negligible damage from all but the Rocket Troopers, who actually did noticeable damage to their over-shield readouts, though still not much.

Once all the Batarians in the main room were down, more came in, though they did not open fire, their leader beginning his typical bad guy speech. "Do you know what has happened to the Batarian people because of the Coalition? We petitioned the Council and had been doing so for many decades to colonize the Skyllian Verge, but in the end it all came to NOTHING, your Coalition just swooped in and took the whole area away from us when you yourselves didn't need it in the first place! We needed the resources and living space, you didn't then and you don't now! The stupid Council gave this turf to you just because they say a military advantage in befriending you!"

"Listen here, Balak, the Coalition offered at one point to provide assistance and even offer partial membership to the Batarian Syndicates." It was kinda obvious to Shepard who this bastard was. "What did you do? Your government tried to shoot the negotiations team, it was a good thing we brought a marine fire team there, now as a Spectre I'm ordering you to either surrender or face the consequences… I hear death by white phosphorus isn't very pleasant, Balak, I urge you to reconsider, Balak…" Tali palmed her flamethrower on cue beside him

"Spectre Shepard, eh? I don't answer to the Council, or to you! You either give me safe passage off this asteroid or I'll set off the explosives I have rigged up with those hostages back there" Balak jabbed his thumb over his shoulder at the groups of hostages tied up near several bombs.

"Balak… get the flying fuck out of here, but remember, I will kill you if I ever see you again." Shepard said through gritted teeth, Tali already starting to hack through the weak firewalls of the first bomb and Garrus getting to work on the second while Balak's buddies began to hustle. Shepard, Wrex and Liara opened up on the defence drones around the room that had begun to advance with the start of the hacking.

After scrambling down to the actual floor of the room from their previous platform positions, the team disabled the final bomb, and ran outside just in time to watch as Balak's ship, a Council-standard frigate in terms of size, lift off. Shepard grinned sadistically behind his helmet as he raised Joker "Joker, weapons free on Balak, has Charn's crew gotten away through the relay yet?"

"Charn's ship has gone through the relay, commander, acknowledging weapons free" Three sets of Zealot SIM Missile trails appeared out of nowhere from behind and above Balak's ship, four quantum pulses smashing into the back of the vessel from nowhere along with two yellow streaks of Proton Cannon shells. The Batarian ship, its engine block almost completely gone, started to drift in space, the Normandy not letting up in its relentless pounding of the target. Within seconds, the ship's core overloaded and it went up in a spectacular explosion, just before the Normandy uncloaked, its 150-meter bulk utterly dwarfing the remains of the other, 80-meter long vessel.

"Hello, Commander, thank you, the asteroid was on a direct impact course on the Capital City of Terra Nova, now it'll be an oblique and relatively low-energy impact in one of the oceans. It'll most likely cause a major tsunami along the coasts, but that'll be nothing compared to what it would have been before…" Simon Atwell said as Shepard turned back inside to release the hostages.

Kate Bowman was the first hostage to speak "All the ones that survived are accounted for, Commander, thank you; it's good to be alive… more or less. Thank you, Commander."

"It was my job, Miss Bowman, don't mention it." Shepard nodded, having removed his helmet. "What's this I hear about a massive tsunami?"

"Terra Nova's authorities are conducting evacuations as we speak."

"I don't think that will be necessary."

* * *

_Terra Nova, Present Time, ETA to impact 3:00:00_

Though Terra Nova only had static defences, shields and no gating capability, that did NOT mean it did not have a whole fleet of Continentals, like any other Coalition colony since the Seraphim War and even more so since the Skyllian Blitz,, Terra Nova had over a hundred Continentals, fully loaded with Civilian Trucks, ready to conduct evacuations in every Capital, Primary or Secondary City. Being a new colony, Terra Nova had a relatively small population, so there were only three towns that needed evacuating (only Continent One had even been colonized)

The colonists methodically entered the vehicles in standard evacuation procedure, only 200 to each massive truck, regulated by small marine contingents in an orderly evacuation. The marines locked down the towers of the towns as they were evacuated and set the shields to block the massive tsunami waves to the limit of their ability (it wasn't much, as the shields were not designed to stop slow masses). After the trucks were filled to standard capacity (in true "emergencies" they could fit four times as many people easily), each Continental picked up their trucks and another wave moved in and dropped their trucks. It took a total of three waves to evacuate all the residents of all the towns, each wave being twenty Continentals per town (112000 people per wave per town). The marines that came with the first wave left with the last, their job was done, for now. Considering initial deployment time and time needed for dropping off the jam-packed evacuation trucks that had been on the Continentals, the whole evacuation took under ten minutes.

The Continentals had originally been shipping the populations of the settlements towards the farthest coast from the Capital City, to board the Overlord-class sea transports (originally intended to help with shipping once colonization expanded to Continent Two) there and to ride out the impact of the asteroid beneath the waves, as the Overlords were capable of submerging. Now that this was no longer necessary, though the coast the Capital was near was still the side where the tsunami would strike, they only had to evacuate some towns. The procedure was finished before Shepard could convince the engineers on the asteroid his newest plan could work.

* * *

The Light Chronotron Cannon overcharged, pointed straight down away from the Normandy, which the SCU was currently still attached to, and fired a ninety-kiloton TNT equivalent pulse down into the asteroid below. The heat vents of the weapon opened up, and vaporized coolant billowed out as new coolant was nanolathed inside the weapon. Three seconds later, the venting was complete and the gun could fire another Overcharge pulse, which it did. This was just after the first directed ninety-kiloton pulse hit the surface of the asteroid, blowing a very deep crater into the 10-km diameter hunk of space rock. The second pulse deepened the crater and fractures began to appear and spider-web away from the impact site as the asteroid trembled but held together. The asteroid stayed in one piece through the third hit but finally began to fragment in the fourth strike. Once the core of the asteroid was exposed by one large fragment breaking away, it was a simple job to orient the Normandy and/or SCU gun to blast the fragments into smaller and smaller chunks until they could be engaged by the Normandy's weapons. Said weapons ensured the meteorites that would fall upon Terra Nova would not be large enough to cause real damage, as in smaller than a small house. The SCU's standard gun also put out some impressive damage with its 300 DPS pulses, two shots per second, into the space debris. After the job was done, the Normandy left the debris field and proceeded toward Terra Nova, following the Restorer (though it had already picked up the Rhino and Shepard's crew) that carried the rescued hostages.

_The crew of the Normandy will be treated to quite a nice fireworks display_, Shepard thought, looking toward the sky from Terra Nova's capital city.

"By the way, Commander, I just realized, I never asked your name…" Kate Bowman had walked over to where Shepard and his crew were lounging about in one of the best restaurants of Terra Nova, enjoying the gratitude of the colonists in one way or another. Wrex was consuming a slightly worrying amount of alcohol.

"Name's Shepard, Commander Shepard."

"As in John Shepard, the Hero of Elysium, Sole Survivor of Akuze, and First Human Spectre John Shepard?" Kate's eyes bulged almost comically.

"That's me."

"Well, it was very nice to meet you, Commander Shepard, you're not exactly… what I expected." She said haltingly.

"That's alright, I'm not what I would expect either." Shepard patted her on the back and walked back to his crew "Wrex, I think you should stop trying to drink Terra Nova dry."

"Come on, Shepard, there's nothing wrong with a little alcohol, even Liara's… damn it, she's not." Wrex did an exaggerated slump. "By the way, I watched a documentary talking about the Koprulu Sector, when are the Zerg and Protoss going to introduce themselves to the galactic community?"

"We're going to wait until they feel they're ready, Wrex, the fear of insectoids in Citadel Space is still so strong that they'd probably attack first, and the Zerg, even if they've been pretty calm the past few years, would probably be able to do a lot of damage to the Citadel Races."

"Liara, you've melded with him, is he telling the truth? Does he know anything else besides what the codex can tell us?" Wrex looked pointedly at the Asari.

"I wasn't looking, and besides, I didn't go that far…"

"You sound like you'd like to go that far, though, should we give you guys some time to spend embracing eternity once we get back to the ship or hotel?" Wrex grinned a Krogan grin, showing his teeth.

"Uh… No! I mean…" Liara stammered, blushing profusely.

"What is he talking about, Liara?" Shepard asked curiously, while Garrus and Tali banged their heads or in Tali's case helmet on the table in disappointment at Shepard's knowledge level.

"I'll tell you when it becomes relevant, Shepard" her voice clearly said: _Don't Push Further, Please!_ And so Shepard didn't push any further, but Wrex did.

"Shepard, it's the term for Asari sex, complete with mind-melding, hence the 'embrace eternity' part." Wrex grinned as Shepard abruptly realized why Liara had blushed so hard.

"Wrex, I think there are times when you should consider… oh I don't know, shutting up?"

"I like the way you think, Tali" Wrex nodded approvingly at the Quarian currently palming her flamethrower.

"Alright boys, I think it's high time we got a move on, let's go check back at the Citadel to see if they have any new and interesting Intel for us… this time around. I just hope we don't run into any more of those help everyone in town situations…"

"Shepard, last I checked, the term was 'side quests'." Garrus stated, raising his cup to his mouth again.

"Garrus, I've been wondering, since the Rhino doesn't need any real maintenance, what exactly do you spend your spare time doing?"

"Besides chatting with the crew? I play remakes of old Earth video games; I really liked the Fable series, so many choices…" Garrus shook his head, grinning vacantly.

Liara shook her head sadly while Shepard, Tali and Wrex collectively facepalmed "How about Real-Time Strategy games, Garrus?"

"Played a lot of them too, kinda like the games from Palaven but not nearly as immersive. It seemed a lot more… advanced to be coordinating a battle from a Strategic or wide-field tactical overview of the battlefield than the way Turian command centers are still run these days" Garrus abruptly stood up "but you're right, Shepard, it's time to get back to the Normandy and check in at the Citadel to see if there's anything else that could help us in our main quest."

"Can you please stop using game terminology, Garrus? It's lame and rather tiring." Wrex said in his gravely voice as he too stood up, Shepard, Liara, and Tali following suit a moment later.

"Hey, you two lovebirds over there! It's time to get moving!" Shepard yelled across the bar at Ashley and Kaidan, who both got up, still talking animatedly about something, he was reminded warmly of how he and Liara would talk about things even before they'd confessed their feelings to one another.

"Personally, I really like using Aeon when I choose a faction for those games about the Infinite War, I mean, sure, the Cybrans have Deceivers and the most multi-purpose and damaging units, and their torpedoes are great, but the Aeon have Asylums and Serenities, that tips the deal, plus the Galactic Colossus has so much more endurance than a Monkeylord…" Kaidan gestured in the air wildly.

"Yeah, but a Monkeylord is much cheaper and does much more damage than a GC, thought of that? And also, Monkeylords have stealth and heavy electron bolters with very good range. Let's not forget the fact that all Cybran T3 Air Units feature stealth systems that actually let them get past a SAM screen, and that Geminis are easily the best Air-Superiority Fighter with their missiles? Salems on land can easily act as a counter for Serenities, they have almost the same range limit and Salems are a hell of a lot more durable and do damage much, MUCH faster."

"Ah, but you forget the debilitation of Cybran T3 Mobile Artillery by the lack of shields and the fact that Spy Planes are very fast and can detect them before being shot down…" Shepard stopped listening; he thought they were talking about themselves as people, not talking about their preferences, but then again their preferences were part of their personality, weren't they? It was an interesting thought, regardless; it was time to go back to the Citadel to see what was up this time.

"Hey, you know what I just figured out?" Wrex suddenly piped up.

"What?"

"Judging by our sheer effectiveness against the Batarian infantry, we are quite akin to a Nod Confessor Cabal, fully upgraded of course," everyone except for the Krogan collectively facepalmed.

"Wrex, to quote you, if this was anime, we'd fall over and a cow would moo in the background at the sheer lameness of that." Shepard stated once he'd removed his hand from his face.

* * *

_In Another String Universe, Earth, January 2053, Shortly After the Third Tiberium War_

"What's the matter, love?" Liara T'Soni stirred sleepily in the arms of her lover and fellow ex-confessor, having been awakened by a simultaneous sneeze from both of them.

"It's probably nothing, Liara, probably just a chill, or maybe someone out there's talking about us." John Shepard blinked sleepily, running a hand through his lover's hair and inhaling more of her scent.

"You think we're the subject of pillow talk between Ash and Kaidan?" Liara looked up at him, their eyes meeting in the more-or-less darkness, lit only by the dim red night time lighting panels favoured by the Brotherhood of Nod, the only lighting Shepard's Scavengers had readily available.

"Probably, I wonder how Wrex, Garrus and Tali are doing; do you think they finished souping up our ride yet?" John appeared thoughtful for a moment "Then again, I'm not sure people who like Black Hand uniforms, like Tali, usually like tinkering with tech as much as she does… We should probably get outside and check on them."

"Sure, honey, just give me a minute." Liara started putting her clothes back on from where they'd discarded them in their shared quarters. Finally, she put the tower-like Confessor helmet, with its advanced optics under her arm and picked up her particle beam rifle from the weapons rack, they had a wide array of uniforms they'd salvaged over the years, so they usually had an easy time infiltrating Nod bases and raising hell, or making off with the occasional bit of GDI or Scrin hardware. "Come on, let's go see what they did with the Reckoner this time" The Scavengers had originally escaped the Brotherhood of Nod in a single Reckoner APC, which had since been modified to allow them to fire on the move but was no longer able to deploy.

Tali had been excited recently over getting more upgrades, the mutant was far better at tech than the average Saboteur, which led the five Confessors (Garrus, John, Liara, Kaidan, Ashley, Jenkins died during their escape) in the unit to wonder why she hadn't been commissioned to be a Commando. Her explanation was that she just wasn't stealthy enough, though of course Wrex had rebutted it with the shining example of Nick Parker from the First Tiberium War and Garrus had cited the performance of the lone GDI Commando, Lt. Fullerton, in Stuttgart, in addition to other arguments. Tali's irritation meant that Wrex and Garrus got on-and-off hot-and-cold showers for the next two days thanks to her hacking skills. But when the two walked outside, they stopped and looked on in horror at what their once-humble Reckoner had mutated into.

A pair of oversized Avatar Warmech lasers, fixed up by Tali after she'd gotten it off two completely wrecked Avatar Warmechs back in Operation: Will Made Flesh sat in the center of the hull as the main turret. Two missile pods, ripped straight off a wrecked stealth tank the group had dragged back to base a few days earlier, formed the anti-air weapons, and a cannon from a Spectre Mobile Artillery piece sat on the back of the APC-turned-tank as a long-range weapon.

"So how do you like our souped-up ride?" The towering strongman known as Wrex, who was also one of the Forgotten that had returned from their self-imposed exile after the Scrin Invasion, had walked up beside the two.

"It's a Nod tank counterpart…" Liara started.

"…of the Mammoth Tank, with more damage power but less armour." Shepard finished for her. "I noticed…" he was cut off before he could state what he noticed.

"Hey guys!" Garrus' features often gave off an avian feel, with his sharp beaky nose, long thin fingers that almost seemed like claws, and very sharp eyes and jaw lines. He also had a barrel-like chest, a slight birth defect that resulted in his chest sticking out further than his chin in a sort of collar-like structure. "What do you think of the less visible upgrades?"

"What did you do this time? Add a set of speakers to fight in style or rather deafen our enemies?" Liara asked after a moment and a sigh of resignation, Garrus had indeed done that at one point, though it seemed to attract every Buzzer in their combat zone the one time they deployed it. That meant the GDI troops they'd teamed up with for that time had a field day with clearing out the residual Buzzers from the Third Tiberium War that still lingered in the area, they just had to track the cloud of Buzzers trailing behind the Reckoner.

"Nope, Tali, hit it!" A large bubble-like shield formed around the once-upon-a-time Reckoner, then the whole vehicle, shield included, vanished from sight with nary a ripple.

"Where the hell did you get THAT from?" Wrex's eyes bulged comically, he'd seen them put in the other upgrades, but this? This was ridiculous…

"A wrecked Reaper Tripod that me and Garrus found a few weeks back, plus a wrecked Stealth Generator from a Stealth Tank" Tali finally poked her head out of the vehicle, having finished tinkering. She wore the barrel-like helmet of typical Black Hand heavy armour most of the time, and was rarely seen without her trusty flamethrower, although she'd stripped the uniform of all Nod symbols visible to herself when wearing it.

"What's gonna happen next, you gonna tell me the boys managed to salvage a Mammoth Tank or maybe get us a functional Planetary Assault Carrier?"

"Uh…" Garrus and Tali exchanged a look, Wrex smiling smugly as Kaidan and Ashley, who had stood by during the whole revelation, shook their heads at Shepard's facepalm.

"Alright, where is it, whatever it is?" Shepard said tiredly as the Confessors he'd escaped with and the Forgotten troops they'd helped along the way moved aside to reveal the whole body of the Reds, over three hundred men and women, grinning while standing around a large, nondescript mass under an enormous canvas witting in the middle of the group's base.

"Well…" The tarp fell, Shepard, Liara, Ashley and Kaidan's jaws followed.

* * *

A/N: Sorry for being relatively lame, but the fight scenes are so typical that didn't bother with too much detail… I can't wait until I get to Geth Incursions and then Noveria, Virmire, and Ilos, can you?

I just had to insert the last part as a final jab at the previous chapter, also, I may or may not decide to eventually write a C&C fic with the ME character names and see how I can spin parallels between them… Though it'll likely be after writing SupCom: KS and SupCom: ME 2 and of course SupCom: The Reclaimers and WorldWar: Supreme Balance. I'm also considering a SupCom: Azeroth sometime in the future, and MOST LIKELY A SupCom: The Thirteenth (the idiotic Colonials of nBSG start a war with an enemy they don't and can't comprehend). Please vote on these ideas, EACH of these ideas, in a review, good, bad, so-so?


	21. Old, Unhappy and FarOff Things

A/N: By the way, for those who didn't know what the various options I listed were, here's the list and some explaining:

SupCom: Koprulu Sector – Starcraft (rather obvious as I posted 1 chapter as per request, note that it's posted under the Starcraft section of the site)

WorldWar: Supreme Balance – The WorldWar series written by Harry Turtledove.

SupCom: The Thirteenth – new Battlestar Galactica, except with the Cylons as the refugees.

SupCom: The Reclaimers – Halo (provides for the Kobolian Colonials in the previous fic, Kobol was one of the shield worlds

SupCom: Azeroth – WarCraft, I really am not completely sure about this, after all things would be a bit ridiculous, but Freedom Guard's "World of WarCraft Halo" fic is also a bit ridiculous.

Onto the real A/N, the Rachni's description of the "sour yellow note from space" sounds awfully like the "Dark Voice" of Starcraft 2 lore, doesn't it?

Thanks to Crimson Rogue for his piece "Uncertain Expectations" giving me the much-needed dialogue at least for the Consort. Note that the chapter title is the Consort (most Asari are "old", and she's a Matron), Septimus and Xeltan, and Zabaleta in that order.

* * *

Chapter 21: Old, Unhappy, and Far-Off Things

"The survey team, according to ExoGeni's final broadcasts, was killed by passing raiders or mercenaries, the names of the deceased will be released once next of kin are notified." Shepard's teeth ground together at the lies the speakers on the Citadel elevators spewed.

"As if things aren't irritating enough as is…" Wrex growled.

Shepard's comm. pinged at that moment "Commander Shepard, the Consort would like to see you in her chambers at your earliest convenience" Avina, the station's VI, intoned.

"What or who is the Consort?"

"She's a highly respected character on the Citadel, it would be wise to go see what she wants, if nothing else, it could be another potential source of information for us." Garrus said "Even though many think of her as a highly-priced and well-trained prostitute."

"Consorts are NOT prostitutes." Liara cut in abruptly but still relatively calmly "They are highly respected among my people for their training in the arts, literature, music and psychology, they are more akin to highly-trained and prized counsellors or psychiatrists than prostitutes."

"Whoa, Liara, never seen you so irritated before, what's the matter?" Garrus held his hands up in surrender and backed up a few steps.

"I don't like the way you just accused a respected member of Asari society of being a prostitute so callously, that's all." Liara went back to her thoughts, mentally annoyed at herself for trying to defend her people without thinking first. It was a frequent occurrence, partly attributed to her isolation as an archaeologist that she would execute the manoeuvre Joker had once described as "Open Mouth, Insert Foot" when in conversation.

"Well, that's a good reason, Liara" Shepard agreed with Liara's claim, after all, being called a whore wasn't polite in any society yet to be known, while he looked around as if hoping to see a neon sign pointing the way to the Consort's location.

Liara was watching his antics carefully, wondering as to the overly calm nature of their mutual confession, she knew Shepard was in essence a good person, or in this case a good man, and he wouldn't lead her on, but still, it was odd how calmly and quickly he'd responded that he felt the same…

On the other side of the equation, Shepard was hoping that when he'd confessed he'd not seemed too abrupt and certain, overly smooth men tended to raise alarm bells for women of any species. The only reason he hadn't been grinning like a total retard at her confession and possibly blurting out something that could ruin it was because he'd engaged some of his brains internal programs to keep the extreme happiness under control at least for a while. "Oh, it seems we've found the Consort's Chambers from what Avina's map tells us."

"Hello, Commander Shepard." The Asari behind the reception desk stood up to greet the crew. "I am Nelyna, one of the Consort's acolytes, the mistress has been expecting you, please proceed." Nelyna said with a smile and a wink as she gestured toward the stairs with her head.

Liara frowned at the gesture, her mind running through possibilities as to what the wink could mean. _If the Consort is interested in seeing Shepard, we at least know she has good taste…_ One part of her mind said with a mad cackle. _What do you mean "we"?_ Another part said in horror while a third part thought _Goddess, I spend fifty years in solitude on digs and_ now _I'm losing it?_

"Liara, what do you think of this matter? Should we go see this Consort or not?" Shepard was slightly worried, Liara was just standing there blankly, not saying or doing anything for the past while. It was odd, she had been the one to advise going to see this figure, or at least say she was highly respected, and now she was frozen at the prospect? "Liara?"

"Hmm? Oh, sorry, what did you say?" Liara blushed at her own bumbling.

"Should we take the Consort up on her request or not?" Shepard thought she looked extraordinarily cute with her blush, and was grinning at her due to said thought. "If not, we can go to Flux and relax there…"

"I vote we talk to the Consort. She could have useful information for us in the future" Wrex and Garrus said simultaneously, looking at each other in surprise.

"I want to go to Flux." Tali said, shuffling from side to side.

"I'm fine with whatever you choose, Shepard." Liara mentally facepalmed, she sounded like a badly scripted puddle of goo… as was quite frequently the case when in close proximity to Shepard. Why Shepard would share the feelings of such a bumbling Asari as herself she would never know…

"Well, I think we have a fairy clear majority, flux will still be there later, Tali, unless the Normandy misfires a Zealot missile in that direction, but that's for another day, and besides, the missile ports of the Normandy are all sealed when in dock anyways." Shepard watched Tali's shoulders slump forward visibly, "we'll go later, I promise."

"Alright, Shepard." She sighed behind her helmet. "Let's go see this Consort."

One bout of navigating through halls and stairs later, the five found themselves entering a lavish room through a hydraulic door. Despite the luxury and wealth that was displayed in the pieces of art and music that artistically decorated the walls, the room was also highly functional, the room of a high-ranking noble, most certainly. The Consort, a woman dressed in impeccably artistic clothing, had her back turned toward them, so Shepard stepped forward, knowing perfectly well that the Consort would tell them when to stop.

"That's close enough, Commander." The woman turned her head slightly toward the group, quickly scanning them before returning her gaze to the large painting that decorated the wall before her, a painting of Thessia's second highest waterfall, if Liara recalled correctly, done by one of the greatest masters in the history of Asari art. "I've heard a great many things about you since you first came to public attention."

John Shepard's eyes narrowed at the back of the Consort's head. "I don't like people scrutinizing me, other than my mother and brother."

"I apologize Commander. I make it my business to know when important people arrive on the station, many of them become clients."Shepard experienced a short flashback of one of his high school English teachers pointing out a passage in a text and saying "This is a prime example of ironic language".

"Intriguing, now, don't you have business to do with the commander?" Liara asked irritably, surprising more than just herself with her tone.

"Yes, I do, I have a small problem that could use your expertise…" With that, Sha'ira turned to face the group directly, giving those who had never encountered her (Wrex still remembered crossing paths back when the Asari before them was a commando) a very good idea of why people would clamour over each other to "bask in her glory", Shepard's mind rolled its figurative eyes after that sarcastic comment.

Liara was tempted to withdraw into her shell and stay there, feeling completely hideous next to this piece of art that had her every motion perfectly planned, every gesture coordinated, every action plotted against effect before moving. Ashley's favourite movies would have described her as "scrap metal" put next to the Matron's.

"Tell me about this problem you're having…" Shepard was wondering when he could get out and have some drinks and chat time with his crew, the Consort's appearance was easy to get through, though he suspected any non-Cybran in this situation would have found it difficult.

"I have a friend, Septimus, a retired Turian general. I won't discuss the details but he wanted me to be more than I could be." Sha'ira looked down for a moment, appearing sad, though Shepard strongly doubted it was authentic, judging by how utterly smooth and choreographed the woman had been thus far. "We had a falling out, now he spends his days in Chora's Den. Drinking and spreading lies about me," at this the Consort lifted her hand up to gently graze Shepard's cheek, a rather irritating act, "if you would speak to him as a fellow soldier I believe he will listen to you and let the matter be."

John was forced to engage a semi-paralysis program that would keep his body from flinching as the woman's hand came up to caress his cheek, the nerve endings were burning under the Asari's touch, prickling painfully at the unwelcome contact. He had to control his implants, especially the under-skin ones, from releasing a jolt of electricity to get her hand off of his face. This woman seriously needed educating on the concept known to some (but not all, not Joker, for example) as privacy and personal space.

To John's right, Liara was reacting similarly to the older Asari's move, feeling strongly inclined, fuelled by righteous fury, to march up to the older woman's face and inform her that she was to immediately remove her limb, or, as far as Liara was concerned, deformed gnarled claws, from the Commander. She was wondering if she could blast the woman with her PSMG and get away with it after she noticed the annoying smile the woman was throwing her way. Of course, if she found Shepard an interesting specimen, she sure did have good taste, and was very good at making people jealous.

John Shepard finally overcame the urge to discharge electricity at the Consort and moved away from the offensive limb "What exactly do you want me to do to him?" He was hoping she didn't try anything else that might make him lose his professionalism… _Yeah, only one woman's allowed to put her hands on me randomly, and those grimy paws that just touched me certainly did not belong to Dr. T'Soni!_ One part of his mind chimed in, another answered humorously _Since when did Liara have grimy paws? I personally think her hands are really nice and soft and warm…_ said part of his mind did a dreamy sigh, then fell silent. A third part was horrified at the second part's squealing, while a fourth was banging its figurative head against the inside of his skull due to the background noise level the other three made.

"Appeal to his sense of honour, remind him of his position as a general," at this Sha'ira slid up to John and nuzzled against him, apparently unaffected by the glares she was receiving from both said man and his Asari companion, "if you could convince him to stop spreading lies about me I would be very grateful." With her request now given, the Consort stepped away from the greatly annoyed Cybran and headed back towards the other end of the room, "now I must ask you to take your leave. I have many clients waiting to see me."

"See you" John was suddenly immensely grateful for his astonishingly large amount of self-control that had prevented him from giving the Consort at least one electric shock. His impression of the Consort sidled up against him was "cold", on the other hand, if Liara had done the same… he smiled despite himself.

Liara was feeling irrationally jealous about the smile on Shepard's face as he turned to leave, probably a smile brought on by the Consort, according to the darker parts of her mind, _The only reason he didn't respond when she was touching him was probably because he didn't want to hurt the team's integrity_. A dark voice said in her head, she shook it off, _No, John has the same sort of feelings for me as I do for him, he would never do such a thing, he's too good for that_. A hand on her shoulder stopped her from moving after the rest of the squad "Is there something I can do for you?"

Sha'ira loved a number of things, teasing young maidens was one of the more obvious ones, they got flustered so easily that a less controlled individual would laugh their ass off at their antics. "I was wondering, young Maiden, how far have you gone with him?"

"WHAT?" Liara had blushed purple "Er, no, just, no, never. He's my Commander after all…" She didn't know where her words were coming from, only prayed that Shepard would not hear them. Sha'ira on the other hand was amused, she knew perfectly well that all of the crew, if they had decided to wait for Liara, had a very good chance of hearing her outburst, it wasn't exactly quiet, after all. It would help the young maiden learn some valuable life lessons about relationships, no matter how Shepard took it.

Outside the doorway, Shepard's hearing picked up Liara's words even through his conversation with Wrex. The background processes that helped run his mind gave the new data input a once-over and then let it by before immediately calling it back from short-term memory for a check-over. John's head twitched violently to one side as if slapped and he winced. _Wow, I guess I was right earlier, I'm not good enough to be talked about in public as relationship material, should have known_… a traitorous portion of his mind sighed in defeat and slumped its shoulders just before another part of his mind hit it with a haymaker that left the first part pitting out a bloodied tooth on the floor. _Get up you motherfucker, you just haven't done enough relationship-like things for her, and besides, she was surprised, and when surprised, wouldn't you be defensive too, and in denial? At least she didn't completely smash you down in self-defence…_ The two parts of his mind promptly started a mental bar brawl that the rest quickly joined in on.

"Hmm, too bad, I was just thinking, you two make a truly adorable couple, I'm sorry to hear you aren't together, another day, Liara T'Soni, another day, perhaps." Sha'ira smiled cryptically as she let Liara go.

Liara quickly made as dignified an exit as possible from the Consort's Chamber, perhaps it would have been easier had she been wearing her actual helmet, she thought, as she noted a completely blank expression on Shepard's face, it was unsettling. Shepard usually looked at her with a caring expression, a twinkle in his eyes and a constant, content smile that seemed to always be present, according to Ashley, only when she was near. That smile was gone, leaving behind only a blank expression, thought his eyes still watched her as she made her way toward him. Wrex, Garrus and Tali all had their arms folded in front of their chests, glaring at her, everyone except Shepard was doing the same.

Shepard shook his head and the old grin was back, the mental bar brawl having concluded in favour of the non-defeatists "Let's get going, Liara, we've got a general to talk down…" The rest of the team noted Shepard's recovery, decided collectively to say nothing about it and instead simply followed along as Shepard made his way to Chora's Den.

* * *

It didn't take that much to convince a only half-sober Septimus to get over his sorrows and go reconcile with Sha'ira, after all, he was a goddamned General and should be old enough to know how to keep his feelings in control! It wasn't certain if it was Shepard's sweet-talking, Wrex's digs or some combination thereof, the classic good cop, bad cop routine, that caused Septimus to cave and agree to go speak with Sha'ira once he'd calmed down.

"You know, Turian, you gotta wonder how the hell Turians won the Krogan Rebellions with generals like you." Wrex had sneered at the half-drunk Turian

"I may be drunk, Krogan, but you're ugly. And tomorrow I'll be sober, and you'll still be ugly." Septimus had replied in irritation.

"All's fair in love and war, Septimus, Wrex's just trying to make you see that you're not helping this falling-out between you and the Consort, so he's doing only what's fair to help you see that."

Wrex snorted, causing Shepard to glare at him, though Septimus didn't notice, looking down at his drink for a moment, before abruptly chuckling and looking up at Shepard "Hah! War, that's what this feels like, all right." He shook his head for a moment as if to clear it. "You know, Spectre Shepard, I never thought I'd see the day when a Krogan had a higher emotional range than I did, but I guess I was wrong…" he turned to address the dark blue armoured Krogan "Urdnot Wrex, are you not?"

"Ah, so, you still remember me, eh, Septimus?" The armour's yellow circuitry glowed slightly brighter at the recognition while Wrex smiled a toothy grin. "It's been a while since we talked."

"Indeed, I still remember the last time I conducted an operation, against your merc band, before I retired." Septimus grinned ruefully "You've done well for yourself, Wrex. Ever consider going back to being the only Krogan counsellor in the galaxy?" He splayed his mandibles in a broad smile.

"Shut up, Turian, will ya? Before I break your smiling mandibles off, that is. Also, go take a shower; the smell of the alcohol on you is almost enough to give _me_ a hallucination."

"Alright, I guess I'll start acting more like a former general should, but could you guys do me a small favour?" Septimus was still smiling.

"What is it?" Shepard asked, breaking back into the Wrex-Septimus conversation while the others, now including Ashley and Kaidan who'd met up with them at the Wards Entrances, were still staring sceptically at Wrex.

"Recently, I came across secret files of an elcor diplomat, Xeltan; I convinced him Sha'ira gave up his secrets, when in fact I spread it out of spite." Liara was beginning to understand why Sha'ira would reject this Turian, which was a simply rude action, hurting someone you claim to have fallen in love with just because of rejection? And it wasn't something small either; it was something that could affect their very livelihood! "He'll probably be at the elcor-volus embassy."

"Okay, we'll do it, now, is there anything else?"

Septimus shook his head slowly as he got off his bar stool, shaking Shepard's hand "Not really, Spectre, thank you for your help, I think I'll go take a bath now to get the alcohol off and think about how I'll deal with my problem." He mumbled while leaving, before abruptly stopping and spinning, still a bit unsteady on his feet. "Oh, and Wrex, when are you taking up your old counsellor's profession again?" Septimus had disappeared in the crowds before Wrex could hurl a bar stool at the Turian's head, everyone laughed at the put-out expression on Wrex's face.

"Yeah, laugh all you want, but beware pranks!" That shut everyone up; Krogan pranksters were legendary for overestimating the durability of their victims, much to the misfortune of said victims and occasionally to the dismay of the pranksters.

* * *

"Shock: How… that is impossible, Self-Assuring: I know him, and Septimus could not possibly have discovered my secrets…" The large elcor intoned in its monotone voice.

"Well, here's the data pad Septimus gave me to pass onto you, he said all the proof you'll need is on there." Shepard passed the elcor the data pad, after a few minutes, the large being looked up at him again.

"In state of shock: Thank you, Commander Shepard. Worried: if Septimus could have found out about my secrets, anyone could have."

"Don't worry, Septimus did it out of spite, I highly doubt a retired Turian general would not have access to high-level hackers, it wouldn't be so easy for the average person."

"Somewhat convinced: Yes, you are right, Commander, Septimus would have the resources for this sort of thing. I shall endeavour to keep my secrets better in the future. Thankful: Please accept the credits, it's the least I could do for you." He transferred a moderate sum of credits to Shepard's account.

"Don't mention it, I like helping people out, see you around some time." Shepard shook hands with the elcor and left, the team meeting up with him at Flux, where he picked up Liara and Tali for the second visit to the Consort's Chambers.

* * *

"I'm glad to have helped, but… is that it? Do you any useful intel you could give me or something else that will help me out?" Shepard asked, prodding for information was always a good battle strategy as long as it didn't annoy the person being prodded. She'd only given them some credits, which was more or less useless for Shepard's crew, and a Prothean trinket.

"Well, there is something else I could give you, but…" Sha'ira looked pointedly at Shepard's team members. Tali was looking around at the artwork while Liara was trying to bore holes into the Consort with her eyes. Shepard immediately understood that she was about to give him confidential information and gestured for them to leave.

"Can you guys wait outside the door until we're done? I think she has confidential information for my ears only." Shepard asked, Tali nodded and made for the door immediately, Liara was slower to get to the door and, as she crossed the threshold, looked back over her shoulder at Shepard and the Consort sitting on the sofa, only arm's reach away form one another. _Yeah, his ears only, does confidential information include moaning and squelching noises?_ Liara thought darkly _I don't think Shepard even realizes what the Consort's going to give him, the overpriced prostitute…_ a part of her mind balked at the hypocrisy, and she bit her lip in embarrassment as she realized it.

Less than a minute later, Liara was almost bulldozed into the wall by Shepard, who had more or less flown out of the door to the Consort's Chambers, then turned to yell "If you have intel, you're welcome to tell me, but don't tell me THAT way!"

Liara had a singularity ready to fire before she realized it, and had her LSMG in her other hand, her shield neckband online as always "what did she do to you?"

"I think it's rather obvious, given my ruffled appearance." Shepard grumbled "Let's get out of here, before I don something I might regret later, such as inflict physical harm upon that woman." He muttered darkly, shaking his head in irritation.

Liara was mute with shock that Shepard, her Shepard, had managed to resist the charms of the Citadel's Consort at point-blank range. Few Asari or members of any other species could hope to even hold the line with Sha'ira, even if they were bonded, in love, and so on, it was rare for them not to be drawn toward the Matron. Wrex, on the other hand, once he'd learned of the whole mess, was less silent, and also far less eloquent than Liara would have been.

One long, uneasy pause after Shepard told the group later: "Shepard… do you know how _unheard of _it is for anyone of any species to be able to resist the Consort?" Wrex asked in the closest thing Krogan had to incredulity, his jaws flaring wide enough to accommodate his own fist if necessary.

"Uh, no I don't." Shepard's deadpan answer to the rhetorical question caused Wrex to look up at the sky or what passed for it on the Citadel forlornly, Garrus and Tali to facepalm, Ashley and Kaidan to laugh at Wrex's pose and Liara to wonder when Shepard had become as socially inept as she was.

"Whatever, Shepard, let's get back to the ship, might be something there, Hackett promised us a mission soon." Ashley said, putting one arm around Kaidan's waist and leaning on him as they started moving off toward the Normandy.

* * *

"Hey, that Shepard kid, been a long time, huh?" a man in a somewhat messy UEF uniform asked Shepard in the Ward Access Corridor to Zakera Ward.

Shepard frowned, his crew had gone ahead to the Normandy with a signal from him "I'm sorry, do we know each other?"

"I guess you don't remember me, Lieutenant Zabaleta? I worked with your mother and uncle, your mother and I served together on the Einstein Gate Construction Ship twelve, thirteen years back. You were just a kid then."

"I didn't see much of her that tour. The ship was on patrol most of the time…" Video calls generally did not include anyone who wasn't ether a) family or b) close enough to be family.

"You can call your mom up and ask her about it, She'll remember old Zabaleta, only one who could beat the mighty Hannah Shepard at poker even once. I also used to work with one of your uncles, but that's a different story…" The man fell silent for a moment, rubbing the back of his neck and shaking his head, taking a deep breath as if to steady himself before continuing. "Listen, I need a favour, I'm kind of short on money these days, I hate hitting you up for money, but a man's gotta eat, right? So, uh, could you spare something? Maybe twenty credits?"

"That won't be a problem" indeed, other than buying meals on planets and stations in Citadel Space, the Citadel Credits were useless to Shepard and crew, Nanolathing Credits were the currency of the Coalition, excluding the Drell, and no one had yet figured out how to convert between the two systems effectively, or rather, no one bothered, conversion was simply a matter of buying good or bartering.

"Hey, you're a good kid, you know that? You ever want to come by and talk, I'll be here. Heh, can't afford a ticket home, right?" The soldier shook his head ruefully.

"See you some other time, man." Shepard said, clapping the other man on the shoulder before walking off toward the Normandy, where the rest of his crew was waiting.

* * *

"Did anything interesting get here yet, Joker?"

"Sorry, Commander, no sign of Hackett's data as of yet."

"Darn, oh well, I want a real-time quantum comm. link to the Orizaba"

"That's the Flagship of… the 3rd Hunter Squadron? Are you sure your mother would appreciate this?"

"Yes, it's about time I had another chat with mom…"

"Hannah Shepard speaking… oh hi, John, how's your mission so far, anything new?"

"It's been doing fine, I want to ask, mom, do you remember a Lieutenant Zabaleta from the Einstein?"

"Ernesto Zabaleta? Have you heard from him? We were great buddies, but I lost track of him after… an incident." Hannah's brow creased worriedly.

"I've seen him here on the Citadel. Looks like he's had some hard times."

"I don't doubt it, you remember the Mindoir campaign, right? How you and James fought your way across the town? Zabaleta was one of the last uninjured marines holding the main administration building a lot of the civilians were holed up in. That spire you boys assisted, he was there, holding out for three hours… he was never quite the same after that."

"Ah…" John let out a sigh of understanding. "All those bodies that filled the main town square the spire was in front of… he saw them all?" The bodies at Mindoir had in some places been piled five or six deep… thousands were executed there without remorse. John had only seen the last trickle of captured slaves, and it had been horrifying enough that he and James had methodically executed every Batarian they came across.

"Correct, the Batarians shot everyone they couldn't use while pouring down suppressing fire on Zabaleta's position, he couldn't do a thing until you boys came along and relieved him."

John suddenly figured out who Zabaleta had been, the same UEF marine he'd vaulted over the cover of when he and James had reached the spire. The one who he'd laid down suppressing fire for as he made a run for the Tomcat Autogun that had been cut off from the Coalition marines.

"Damn, I only saw a few civilians get killed, and that riled me enough to execute every Batarian I met on the planet, even those that tried to surrender in the end… He's got PTSD, is that why he was on the Citadel?"

"He was still a good marine after that, but whenever he was off-duty he would get himself drunk, even though he never showed up on duty drunk, his superiors, aka me, found that it was riding him, the memories, even though we were separated pretty far by rank, I managed to get him some leave scheduled. He's still got two weeks left, but if he's stuck on the Citadel, that might be a problem, I think you should send him to the Coalition embassy so that he could get a proper ride home."

"That would be the right thing to do, or I could send a ship to pick him up, since ultimately he's still under my jurisdiction, but it would be better if he did It himself."

* * *

"Hey, you're back, do you want to chat?"

"I spoke to my mother, she told me about you and Mindoir, also, I was there, remember the two Cybran marines that ran across the square to reach you guys? I was the one that vaulted over your cover, I think that and what my mother told me let me get a pretty accurate picture of Mindoir for you."

"Does it? I wonder… People tied like prize hogs. Locked in cages, clawing and screaming as they're loaded into cargo pods…" Zabaleta bowed his head "And we couldn't reach them, hundreds of Batarians had us pinned, our armour was good but just the number of rounds thrown at us would propel those who tried to advance back behind cover like a sailboat, kept alive only by their emergency fields and medi-gel… All we could do was watch as they hauled thousands away… those of us that weren't knocked unconscious by pain of our injuries. I've been looking for years to make that sight go away, what have you got, huh?" The man's voice had become a raspy whisper "At least you and your brother were mobile, able to move and strike, the best we could do was hunker down and pick off the occasional target…" he said the last part as if to himself before he looked Shepard in the eyes

"I'm not going to give you money to drink yourself to death, you need to stop this."

"If you don't have a better option, just give me 20 credits, a good bottle of whiskey, enough to stop the dreams…" The man was still speaking quietly, raspily.

"My mother said you should go to the Coalition Embassy, she'll arrange for you to get help, and get back home, you're not the only one who's seen that particular type of hell, she'll be able to get someone who can help you."

"The Embassy? Well, alright, if she says so, I'll do it, she's always stuck up for me in the past, I'll go to the Embassy and get a ride back to the 3rd Hunter Squadron, she'll know what to do."

"That's the spirit, Marine, just one more thing though…instead of trying to make the dreams, you should consider them a constant reminder of why you fight on despite the memories, to make sure that sort of thing never happens again."

"I heard about Akuze, John, I remember wondering how you got through having your whole platoon dying in even more horrific ways before your eyes… Now I know, thank you." The man shook John's hand and patted him on the back before walking off with a sense of determination in his steps.

"I remember that walk now; I think I used to know him when I was young…" Shepard smiled to himself of a time when he and James had played soccer with some of the soldiers under his mother's command, the same man that was walking off into the distance had played goalie for John and James' team, and they'd won more than they lost. "Good luck, Lieutenant, I hope you find peace one day…"

* * *

"Hey John, I have some new and interesting data for you." Hackett said with a wave from his ACU pilot chair, which he did almost all command duties from, including commanding his fleet via hologram.

"What would you ask of me?" Shepard replied cautiously, Hackett had played more than one prank so far on Shepard, the least of which was telling him that the various artefacts the team collected everywhere were rare. They were not.

"We've detected some Geth outposts being established in the Armstrong Nebula of the Skyllian Verge. We'd like you to go and crush them, to the Council a show of the power of even one Coalition corvette."

"That sounds like an actual mission for once, thanks, Admiral; I trust the standard Intel packages have been sent over?"

"They have, you should check your personal or bridge console for them. Good luck, Hackett out." The line went dead.

"Joker, set a course for the Hong System, Second planet, Casbin." Shepard read off the Intel report.

"Aye sir, departing Citadel." A gentle shudder indicated the ship was pushed to maximum thrust. "Entering quantum FTL… now!" A moment later "We are now over Casbin, please feel free to prepare to disembark. Quantum FTL coils recharging, 1% charged, thank you for flying Joker Airlines."

"Joker?"

"Yes sir?"

"Assemble the team, and do us a big favour, shut up for about two seconds."

"Shut up? What's that?"

"Don't' make me warp your ass, Joker." Kaidan's distant voice came over the PA.

"Shutting up now."

* * *

A/N: Not very exciting, but hey, Geth Incursions is on it way… and for some reason I'm compelled to write the second chapter of SupCom: KS right about now.


	22. Geth Incursions

A/N: For those who are interested, SupCom: Koprulu Sector has been posted, four chapters, a little over 24,000 words as of December 20, 2010. Note that Ch 2: The Gathering Storm of this fic has been changed slightly to accommodate for SupCom: KS.

By the way, I have removed the bit of "Uncertain Expectations" by Crimson Rogue that I missed during editing. I borrowed some of his speech for the Consort, since I was too lazy to go look up a YouTube video, and then I changed most of the other stuff, but I accidentally missed a bit, that bit has been removed.

Also, ideas and suggestions in reviews are very welcome, and will be considered and responded to, sometimes by incorporation.

For those who want more of SupCom: KS, I am afraid that some of the newer add-ons to the Raider suite (btw size-wise it's closer to the Marauder suit, and has the SupCom 2 UEF ACU style of head/helmet) would instigate a lynch mob unless I show them in this fic first, because timeline-wise that fic is after this one. Please note that the process may take a number of chapters.

* * *

Chapter 22: Geth Incursions

Casbin, July 8, 3868

"A new day, a new assignment, what fun!" Garrus deadpanned as the Rhino dropped form the Restorer.

"A new day, a new set of kills, what fun!" Wrex countered, grinning as the Rhino began to charge toward the Geth outpost.

* * *

"A new day, a new dose of boredom." Wrex groaned, it had been fun watching the Rhino's guns mow down the Geth snipers and Rocket Troopers, as well as dodging the rockets like it was nothing. However, when a Geth Dropship began dropping off Shock Troopers in droves, things had quickly become very boring.

"Everybody out! Keep killing those Shock Troopers while I use the Rhino's guns on the Dropship!" The Rhino's guns had once been able to pitch up or down up to 30 degrees, but now, with improved actuators upgrade, they could pitch up to 45 degrees up and down. In other words, the Dropship would NOT have an easy time getting away, especially considering the Normandy had just entered atmosphere. The Restorer was flying circles around the wasp-like ship, dodging fire and firing incessantly into the shields of the Geth Dropship.

"NOW it's not so boring…" Wrex grinned as he, Garrus, Liara and Tali bailed. Liara immediately deployed a Singularity to ensure the Shock Troopers coming down would be ideal for target practice. He opened fire with his Gauss Chaingun, watching the osmium-iridium darts fly from the barrel, while Garrus methodically sniped the ones Wrex missed. Wrex frowned; it was a lot easier to kill the Geth than usual, though they were usually not difficult either. Tali provided the answer, her armour circuitry active in deploying an area Overload, while she kept firing with her SMG.

Finally, when the Restorer was just under half structural integrity, the Normandy turned up, swatting the smaller and weaker Geth Dropship down within moments, before it could get away. This was greatly eased by the damage already done by Rhino and Restorer alike.

After Shepard's team finished looting the Geth outpost and burnt it to ashes, a transmission came through "Hey, Shepard, we're picking up an anomalous signal, if your team wants to have a little fun, go to these coordinates!" Joker said over comms.

"Alright, Joker, see ya in a bit!" Shepard responded "Team, come on back in, walking is too slow for this sort of thing…"

* * *

"I don't like Armatures and those Geth Turrets." Shepard stated as the Rhino was picked up again by the Restorer.

"Why?" Tali asked, curious.

"They're usually outdoors, and outdoors, nothing in Council Space can match up to a Rhino except maybe three or four Geth Colossi working together, at least, that's my conservative estimate. If I want to be optimistic, it'll take a lot more than that." Shepard shrugged "It's pretty much a waste of time killing them, it's not like we live in a role-playing game, at least in those you get experience for kills." He crossed his arms in irritation.

"Makes sense, Shepard, investing our valuable Saren-hunting time with no return is a bit frivolous." Garrus shrugged

"Uh, Shepard, please remember that for the Citadel Races, an Armature is a pretty tough armoured vehicle." Tali said, glaring at Garrus.

"Sorry, that was a bit arrogant… Yeah, you're right to knock me down a notch, Tali, after all, the Armature's ancestor was the mainstay Geth armoured unit during the Geth Uprising…" Shepard looked down at the ground.

"In this case, Shepard, I think that the Quarian was right, though perhaps from my thousand-some years of experience silence would have been a better response." Wrex commented.

The three Geth Armatures and three Geth Turrets were guarding a small sensor station that was now bits and pieces of molten metal a la particle cannon. As Shepard had said, it had been ridiculously easy, he didn't even have to pull any crazy moves (though he did just for laughs, maniacal laughs, and to make sure the Rhino's inertial stabilization system still worked).

* * *

_Antibaar, Tereshkova system, July 8, 3868_

"You know, I suddenly realized that this Saren-hunt is going to be supremely boring unless we get to do some installation warfare." Garrus said, shaking his head sadly. The Rhino had torn down two Geth Colossi, eight Rocket Troopers, and half a dozen snipers with ridiculous ease from long range. They completely kited the Geth while the Rhino's high speed and manoeuvrability kept most of the siege pulses and rockets from even hitting the over-shield, which was in the style of the Harbinger Mk IV's standard shield, a spherical bubble covering the tank. (Note that the Harbinger Mk IV used now, if upgraded, gains personal shield with the Personal Shield upgrade and increases its shield bubble power if equipped with the Over-shield upgrade)

"I agree, Liara, what do you think?" Tali asked the Asari, who was busy observing Shepard.

"Huh? Oh, yes, it's not very combative at the moment, but I don't mind, it's a nice change of pace."

"If you're gonna spend that much time watching Shepard why don't you hurry up and have sex with him already?" Wrex wondered aloud, causing Liara to blush.

Shepard, over in the pilot's seat, feigned ignorance and focused his processing capacity on micromanaging the Rhino. "Shit, not another Dropship!" He cursed as the contact showed up on his strategic display. "Boys, time to get out and help suppress the units while the Rhino slowly chews away at the sucker… Wish we had the SCU here, one Overcharge shot would have done it…"

The two Geth Primes presented a slight challenge without the Rhino's support, but with Gauss Chaingun and Infantry Nanodart Launchers, they didn't last too long… After they went, the other troops were mown down, shortly before the Dropship fled, trailing smoke, and hunted by the Restorer, which was almost on-par in firepower. The ship went down soon thereafter, while Shepard's team concerned themselves with looting the outpost.

* * *

_Maji, Vamshi system, July 9, 3868_

_Cuddling with Shepard is so much nicer than this, and so much less boring…_ Liara thought as she leaned back in the Rhino's comfortable seat, watching Shepard lazily pilot the Rhino, running circles around the turrets while the Particle Cannons melted them down. It was nice that the mountains were such (and the Geth were so stupid) that they only had to deal with one or two turrets at a time, which was absurdly easy for the Rhino's guns.

After the mountain pass, the Rhino came upon another small encampment of Snipers and Rocket Troopers, which were as usual cut down. Liara suspected that Shepard could have done this whole job by himself, while Tali, Liara, Wrex and Garrus were raiding the outpost for supplies, until an enormous crash sounded outside.

"What was that?" Tali asked in alarm as the four peeked outside with gun cams.

A large chunk of flaming wreckage that looked suspiciously like a portion of the fuselage of a Geth Dropship rested where the Rhino had been a few moments ago. _Shepard had said he would wait outside and keep any Geth Dropships that turned up off their backs… Shepard!_ Liara felt her heart skip a beat as she trembled for a moment.

"Commander? Commander? Please respond, Commander!" Joker shouted over comm. Liara didn't hear him, but she heard a noise of shifting metal before Tali dragged her back inside.

"Let go of me!" She yelled, shoving the Quarian's hands off her. "We gotta get Shepard!"

Tali grabbed Liara and shook her "Are you crazy? Shepard's transponders say he's still alive, but that wreck might go up any second!"

BOOM!

A smattering of smaller pop-pop-pops of ammunition stores going up from the wreckage kept the ground team inside while their comms crackled to life "Well, boys, it did go up, but that was because I had to get out, see?" By the time they'd gotten into the open again (read: Liara used biotics to enhance her own strength and drag Tali, Garrus AND Wrex outside while they were trying to stop her from putting herself in danger), Shepard was lounging against the side of the Rhino and the Geth Dropship fragment had a roughly Rhino-sized (and shaped) hole in the side, where the tank had blasted its way out.

* * *

_Rayingri, Gagarin System, July 10, 3868_

"Dammit, an underground facility… gonna have to leave the Rhino… wait, we have a target, Dragon's Teeth Tripods!" Kaidan was saying before he reported in alarm, transmitting his observations and the sensor data of the Restorer to the Rhino where Shepard's team waited, tucked under the body of the Restorer. "Eliminating now… dropping you off, Commander."

"Understood, Kaidan, you and Ash have fun up there, but make sure the seats don't end up smelling all funny, ya hear me?" Both of the people in the Restorer's cockpit blushed at Shepard's comments, Ashley rolled her eyes while watching the Quad Light Laser eliminate a number of the horrible tripods they'd seen elsewhere.

"Understood, Commander, approaching Drop Zone now." The Rhino's docking clamps disengaged and the vehicle fell over a hundred meters to the ground below, slowed by the mass manipulators (based on quantum technology) and inertial adjustors.

"Was the research outpost Cybran?" Shepard asked Kaidan over comms while directing the Rhino to the entrance of the facility.

"No, Aeon, that's the problem, with the dragon's teeth…" Kaidan shook his head, Shepard frowned and nodded.

"I understand, Kaidan, we'll be in touch shortly." Shepard spoke before switching to the squad channel for transmitting "Alright guys, everyone out, looks like we're in for some close=in action, yes Wrex, your favourite." The big Krogan grunted in response, his Seraphim Heavy Armour shoulder towers bobbing up and down as he palmed his trusty Sonic Pulse shotgun in expectation for the firefight ahead.

Shepard hit the ground and waited for his squad, his LBR sweeping the surroundings until they were all out, then he se the tank to guard mode and moved out toward the installation entrance. Upon entering the first room, he and Wrex, the point men, were immediately forced to lay down a barrage while Liara's multiple Throws and a singularity kept the husks away. After the husks had become stuck in the singularity, Tali had signalled them to cease firing, stepped forth, and let loose her flamethrower. Needless to say, burnt cybernetics soon littered the ground and the threat board was clear. Also, the squad had dealt with looting the entry room quite thoroughly.

The main chamber of the facility held more husks, a LOT more husks, with the net result that Liara was deploying singularities as fast as she could muster the energy and Tali was deploying her Fire Arc ability just to keep the team from being swarmed. She'd been pressured into playing a remake of Command & Conquer Generals: Zero Hour by Wrex, Ken and Gabby, hence the "The earth will burn!" quote. Wrex swapped out for his rather unwieldy Gauss Chaingun, delivering 8.6 kg TNT equivalent with each 2-kg osmium-iridium slug at 6 km/s, and went on a killing spree, the inertial adjustors and mass manipulators keeping recoil manageable. With assistance from the support-type weapons of Shepard and Garrus, the team eventually managed to clear the room out, though the bodies of husks were stacked two or three deep in some places by the end of the battle.

"Let's see… more husks inbound!" Shepard called just before a tunnel in the back rooms opened and husks poured out… more like marched, there were only about seven. Two Temporal Fizzes and a few Gauss, Laser and Phasic rounds from the party took care of that problem… and then a bunch of Geth looking to die appeared…

"You'd think they'd learn not to annoy us by now, considering their evolution back before the Uprising." Tali commented.

Liara shrugged "Maybe they just haven't gotten used to our tech superiority yet…"

"I wouldn't be so sure, I hear the Geth have evolved fast enough to stay ahead of the Citadel Races in many aspects…" Garrus commented.

"And what does that say about the Citadel Races?" Wrex prompted, taking down yet another Geth Destroyer in a volley of ultra-dense kinetic energy penetrators.

"Compared to the Coalition?" Garrus responded. "I'm inclined to agree, after all, some of the eldest Asari still alive are a little under two thousand years old and remember when the Council's long-distance exploration probes first discovered Earth…"

"Like my mother?" Liara asked, using a Geth Trooper as a baseball bat (courtesy of biotics) on several other Geth "After all, Matriarchs are generally over 1200 years of age."

"Remind me what we're talking about again?" Shepard cocked his head, looking down at the ruins of the last Geth.

"Asari have three distinct stages in their lives, Matrons are generally over 500 years of age, though it may be sooner or later, and Matriarchs tend to be over 1200 years of age." Liara stated. "That's part of the reason that I'm still considered a child by many Asari."

"Well unless Shepard's a pedophile, you sure aren't a child to him, right Shepard?" Wrex said with a Krogan grin. Shepard and Liara rolled their eyes.

"Anyways, back to what we were talking about, some of the oldest Asari remember the old Council's decision to leave your planet alone, as it was still a pre-nuclear world, to develop on its own. I'm very; VERY thankful they decided to do that." Garrus said.

"And WHY would you be thankful, Turian? Remember how the Coalition curb-stomped the Hierarchy?" Wrex asked suspiciously while they were going through the drawers and cabinets of the base for any and all useful items.

"Well, look at our guns, much better than even Spectre Gear, yes?" Garrus cocked a brow and did the best Turian equivalent of an anime "annoying smile".

"Yeah, you're right this time, Turian." Wrex grumbled before raising his voice "Nothing more here, Shepard!"

"No more stuff here either!" Liara reported.

"There's nothing else particularly useful here, Shepard!" Tali concurred. If it was a Migrant Fleet salvage operation, just the sheer amount of punishment that the parts of the cabinets and walls could withstand would demand they be brought back for armour or hull plating research. After all, they'd stood up to splash damage from Temporal Fizzes, Flamethrowers, and ULPAs, and they could deflect glancing blows from the other weapons. This was more than she could say for Geth Armature plating or even in some cases Geth Colossus plating, in other words, even Coalition-issue _cabinets_ were armoured like typical _Landcruisers/Tanks_ in Citadel Space.

"Alright guys, let's move out…" Shepard led the way, then stopped short at the entrance "Where's the Rhino? Kaidan, where's the Rhino?"

"It's helping us hunt a Dropship, Commander; it's nice we got that actuator upgrade, yes?"

"I'm almost wishing we hadn't upgraded the actuators and tracking programs…" Shepard said slowly, shaking his head "Weapons free, team!" The incoming Geth Troopers, Shock Troopers, Rocket Troopers and Snipers began to burst into showers of sparks and fly around biotically with a moving Singularity, manipulated by Liara. Tali kept up the area overload beam emission, centered and focused on the singularity as its target area. Garrus, Wrex and Shepard laid down a wave of death while the two specialists did their best to help with one SMG hand each.

The result of the experiment was that Temporal Fizzes and Singularities did not mix very well. When they'd entered the field they had slowed down and upon rupturing had destabilized the singularity, with the net result of flinging Geth parts all over the ground.

"Well, that was an interesting exercise." Shepard blinked once the parts had stopped bouncing. "Next time, I'm not doing that, those Geth weapons fetch some nice money at the Citadel…"

"What do we spend the money on, Shepard?" Ashley asked over the comms.

"Well, I don't really know yet, other than for Citadel Races food, still, it's nice to save for a rainy day." Shepard scratched his head. "How's the Dropship hunt?"

"Go to strategic view and you'll see that the Rhino is pretty close to your location now, we dealt with the sorry bastards."

"Thanks, Ash."

"Ya know, Shepard, you'd expect there to be an HQ for the Geth, but these four outposts all seemed the same, I wonder…" Kaidan commented, also over comms.

"A signal's coming into the outpost, Shepard!" Tali had picked something up. "It's from somewhere in the cluster… Normandy, an you triangulate?"

"We read ya, signal's from Grissom system, probably Notanban." Joker said "Get back here and we'll get moving."

"We're on our way, Joker." Shepard told the pilot as they climbed into the Rhino, which the Restorer had just dropped and was still hovering over. Once they secured themselves, Shepard opened the transmission channel to Kaidan "Hit it!"

Ten minutes later, they were docked to the Normandy again; the Rhino still slung under the Restorer, the team had boarded the gunship just as a precaution for Quantum FTL. There had never been an incident where something went wrong, at least not in the last thousand years, but still, never hurt to be careful "Jumping in five, four, three, two, one." A small feeling of vertigo was felt by every crew member for a moment before it settled "Jump Complete, signal traced, destination, Solcrum."

"What's our ETA, Joker?"

"Ten minutes, sir."

"Got it."

* * *

"Well, there are the Geth heavy hitters, and here's our response." Shepard deadpanned as the sniper towers went down one after the other, thanks to particle cannon beams cutting through the bases, this was after they'd taken down the Rocket Troopers on top with two bursts, three beams each, cutting through the Geth effortlessly.

The Colossi were a bit of a bigger problem, literally, though one was slightly hindered by a ruined sniper tower landing on it. However, against the three Particle Cannons, over-shield bubble, "personal" shields and structural integrity fields of the Rhino, they couldn't exactly do much. Their siege pulses rarely scored a hit due to the Rhino's far superior speed, manoeuvrability, and of course firepower smashing down on the Colossi shields.

After the last of the Geth outside were down, and the Rhino had been set to Guard mode, the group entered the underground facility, unleashing their Tech, Biotics, and as many automatic weapons as they could on the small horde that awaited them, Hoppers were dealt with rather forcibly by Throw and Tali's flamethrower, while Snipers were cut down by Garrus's LBR and the Destroyers, Shock troopers and Troopers were engaged by the rest of the team, including Liara's spare hand that was not feeding energy to the Singularity she was waving around the room, grabbing as many Geth as she could.

Shepard's Temporal Fizz Launcher helped slow down the four charging Destroyers so Wrex's Gauss Chaingun could chew through their shields and bodies, then turned the weapon on the Hoppers that were dodging Liara's throws and Singularity, as well as Tali's Shotgun and SMG fire. One hit would slow down and severely damage a Hopper, giving the team a chance to simply pick it off.

Two Geth Juggernauts entered the fray with a new host of Troopers, opening fire with their rockets, which impacted solidly on the team's over-shields. Liara's over-shield shattered with the second strike and most of the destructive energies expended themselves against Tali's personal shields, their original target. Said Juggernauts were then fizzed by Shepard, causing them to slow down considerably while the temporal distortions attached to their masses attempted to realign with normal space-time. Wrex took great pleasure in cutting down the Troopers while Garrus, Tali and Liara hit the Juggernauts with everything they had. Shepard was busy keeping the whole crowd slowed down with his Temporal Fizz Launcher.

Once the last Geth fell to the ground motionless, silence descended upon the field, only broken by a haunting melody "That… sounds like a Quarian singing a lament…" Tali frowned under her helmet, the eye-lights on her helmet narrowing "What is _this_?" She said, having walked up to the console the sound was coming from.

"Perhaps the Geth are beginning to understand the idea of mourning?" Shepard suggested, earning a look from Tali, as well as a tilt of the head and tapping of the foot, obviously a "yeah sure" gesture.

"That sounds just crazy enough to make some semblance of sense, Shepard." Liara said helpfully.

"Well, let's loot this place and get out of here, don't forget to pick up all the Geth weapons, though I still have to find a reason to spend all the credits…" Shepard mumbled the last part as he checked the back rooms. Coming across a terminal, he found something very, very interesting… "Tali… you'd better come take a look at this."

"Yes, Shepard? Something to decrypt?" The slightly synthesized quality of Tali's voice was particularly prominent in the confined space.

"We've got a console filled with Geth data over here; can you make two copies of it?"

Tali turned on her forearm computing pod and projected the hacking console from her chest holoprojector "Certainly, Shepard, though I must ask, why two copies?" She started the copying process, watching the indicator fill up as hundreds of terabytes of data was transferred in the space of a few seconds, and the computer pod ejected one of the data storage matrices she'd had plugged in. It resembled one of the old human USB devices she'd heard of, but it held a whole lot more data than those "keys" had, the size was just for convenience.

"Well, remember our talks about your pilgrimage and what it signifies? I hope this makes a good pilgrimage gift, Tali." Shepard looked at her with bright red helmet optics as she stared back with her green ones before bowling him over with a hug.

"Ow." Shepard said, rubbing the back of his head as he got up, the Quarian helping him up.

"I… I don't know what to say Shepard, this… this is incredible, it's just that… you do realize that now I have a Pilgrimage gift, I'm kind of obliged to return to the Migrant Fleet, at least temporarily, once this Saren-hunt is over? I'll try to join up with you in time for the battle with the Reapers, I can guarantee that."

"Tali, you're my friend, well okay more like my sister but still, friends help friends and family helps family, at least, it is this way in both the Migrant Fleet and usually the Coalition. Let's get moving, we have a lot more stuff to do before this whole mess is over." HE clapped her on the back as they left the data room together.

Liara opened a private channel "For the record, Shepard, Wrex and Garrus agreed that scene was pretty cute and cautioned me about it, but I thought it was really sweet of you to do that for Tali, good job, Shepard."

Shepard set his to private channel as well "Thanks, Liara… wait, how did they know what I said?"

Liara looked around and whispered conspiratorially "Joker says we should not always be transmitting to the Normandy."

"JOKER!" Shepard got only laughter from the Normandy end of the line.

* * *

"Commander, we've got something new from Hackett and the Council!" Joker reported, raising his hands in surrender while leaning as far back as his chair allowed, seeing as how Shepard's helmet, complete with black spikes and menacing red optics was about two centimetres from his nose and the man's hand was resting on his Laser Pistol at his side holster. "Uh, can I breath now, Commander"

"Relax, Joker, just playing with ya. I'll be in the conference room to talk to Hackett, see ya." Shepard grinned with his helmet lights (A/N: Think EVE from WALL-E) and walked off.

"I think that's the first time I've seen you sweat drop, Joker." Kaidan commented from the co-pilot's station.

"Oh, shut up, will ya?" Joker knew it was no good trying to blackmail the biotic unless he wanted to "accidentally" break a leg while sitting in his pilot's seat.

* * *

"Anyways, John, congrats on the mission, I believe the Council has a new lead for you to follow… though I really didn't like their wording."

"I agree, after all, I am not a dog to be led around on a leash by anyone, right?"

"Too true, John, too true." Hackett shook his head slowly "Anything you want to report?"

"I have some Geth data to transmit to you." Three seconds later, the transmission was done "Have you received it, sir?"

"Yep, it's looking fine, is that it?"

"Yes sir, nothing else to report."

"Very well, take care, John, Hackett out."

Shepard nodded in respect as the hologram winked out "Joker, patch through the transmission from the Council." HE looked back at all six members of his ground teams "Be careful, for here be assholes."

"Patching through now, you know, they called BEFORE Hackett, so they might be a little annoyed…"

"Shepard, you sure took your time, didn't you?" the Turian started before the Asari could say anything, though her mouth was open.

"Sorry, _Councillor_, but I was clearing out Geth outposts in the Armstrong Cluster, I don't suppose anyone else was interested, after all, it was only human interests, yes? It had nothing to do with the Council, though we have an embassy and a treaty, yes?" The treaty had been non-aggression only; no official alliance was established, but those were details for another time.

"Technically, it did not have anything to do with us, as the treaty stipulated…" Armin, the Salarian, started before Shepard cut him off.

"Get to the point, you didn't call me just to talk about what you had for dinner, did you? What's this new lead I hear of on Saren?"

"There are rumours of Geth interest in the corporate world of Noveria, in the Pax System of the Horse Head Nebula." The Asari said, trying to keep her compatriots from acting like utter idiots. _Yeah, good luck with that_, Shepard thought darkly "We need to know why, and what they are doing there, it is most likely linked to Saren's activities, and we need you to investigate. Spectres are among the only Council agents Noveria even sort of respects, so…" Seeing the battle of wills and glares between Shepard's crew and her compatriots, she sighed and facepalmed "Giving you the data package now, happy hunting, Spectre."

_I remember way back when we first discovered Earth, then decided to call back the exploration fleet because we already had enough territory and colonies to satisfy all our needs… And we thought the primitives of that pre-nuclear planet could not possibly advance fast enough to become a threat… how very wrong we were._ Tevos thought as she started reminding her fellow Councillors about how to deal with Shepard, and how NOT to annoy him. She thought back to her days as a Commando and smirked, then reminded them that "Back when I was only a few hundred years old, I would have gotten pretty angry if you'd tried that sort of line on me, Velarn, it's not healthy to provoke your agents too much, and it just makes us seem like idiots."

* * *

A/N: By the way, for all you Legion fans out there, I am NOT putting him in during ME 1 events! However, I will try to find a point to insert him before the Reaper IFF mission later on, after several more fics worth of stuff happening with the Coalition and various powers.


	23. Noveria

Chapter 23: Noveria

_Port Hanshan, Noveria, Pax System, Horse Head Nebula, 4:00 PM Local Time, July 11, 3868_

"This is Noveria? Any info Joker?"

"No, I'm NOT an Adjutant, Shepard, unlike that AI Raynor's Raiders owns for their ship, I don't automatically hook up to the network… but still, I got you some data, it's an ice world, but that shouldn't be a problem considering your suits. There are numerous hot labs on the surface where experiments too controversial or dangerous to be elsewhere are conducted. By the way, Shepard, Brackman sent over something recently that he wants you to test ASAP, it's a new type of Heavy Weapon, he suggests replacing your Light Plasma Cannon with it, just for now and until you feel you've experimented enough with it."

"Alright, Joker, I'll grab the stuff later, but what you said about Noveria… not a good sign." Shepard said as they approached the planet in his suit's strategic display, on his chest holoprojector console.

"Noveria Traffic Control to Unidentified Vessel, you are being tracked by automated defences, and we will open fire if you do not cease and desist or identify yourselves." Typical ass of a traffic controller voice…

"This is the CSC Normandy, requesting permission to dock." Joker responded.

"Coalition ships are not welcome here, leave. Now."

"We have a Spectre onboard on an important mission, requesting permission to land."

"Denied, please leave our airspace or we will open fire."

"Are all your defences automated?" Shepard asked.

"Yes, why do you ask?" The traffic controller finally stopped speaking in monotone.

"Unless you want to be rendered defenceless, I strongly recommend you let us land right now." Shepard said in a voice that seemed colder than Noveria itself, he was generally a nice, warm sort of guy according to his shipmates, but he absolutely hated corrupt corporate worlds…

"Our weapons and shields are designed to stand off cruisers, how do you expect to punch through with a single heavy frigate?"

Shepard didn't deign to reply, instead, he manually aimed the Dual Proton Cannons at the side of a mountain peak some distance away and triggered two blasts, one second between the two pairs of shells. The net result was that a little under 2.5 kilotons TNT equivalent of energy was expended against the mountain (A/N: 4 shells equal 460 damage, so don't complain about my math, 600 is 3 kilotons after all), blowing a large chunk out of the snow and starting a small avalanche. "Does that answer your question?"

"I said our weapons and _shields_, or did you not hear me?"

"I don't think _you_ heard _me_," He changed the channel to in-ship only "Joker, One Zealot per target, Dual Proton Cannons free, Quantum Cannons free, Zappers on Missile Defence" The Zapper TMDs were in fact effective against small targets, but it was better to leave them for what they were designed for. "Fire on my mark…"

Shepard toggled the transmit channel one more time and "Noveria Traffic Control, you have one more chance to let us in peacefully, otherwise, we will batter our way in to discover exactly what you are hiding. Council Spectre, Commander John Shepard Out."

"We do not submit to intimidation, Shepard, leave or be shot down, we care not which." The mass accelerator turrets on the surface had all turned toward the Normandy. "We will fire in sixty seconds if you do not leave."

"Joker, what are the readings on those surface guns?"

"Hardly more powerful than a T1 Point Defence, with a few that may be able to match up to a Light Oblivion Cannon, and they call that enough to stand off cruisers, hah, If I wasn't afraid of breaking something I'd be laughing my ass off." Joker responded.

"Let them get off the first shots, but have all our weapons ready to fire, disengage the Restorer but hold it inside our shields, make sure it has good targeting solutions too, and make sure its Zealot launchers are linked! Once they fire on us, weapons free."

A few moments passed before the ground batteries opened up on the Normandy and the Normandy's many guns blasted right back. It took a few seconds for the ground guns to fire again, but by the time they prepared for a third volley the Normandy had cloaked and moved while the Restorer flew too close to the ground for the Defence Towers to do anything. In short order, the shields were breached and the Restorer blew up the Generators to make sure the shields would not go back up. The defence towers went up one by one, when the last one was gone, the Normandy de-cloaked. One hundred and fifty meters of pissed-off Coalition Corvette loomed over Port Hanshan, the main spaceport of Noveria. "Noveria Control, are you interested in offering us a berth now? Be warned, if you bring more than five guards, we will blast your facility apart from the inside, or maybe I should do that right now…"

"You're welcome to dock sir! Don't shoot; I was just doing my job!" The traffic controller sounded evidently terrified.

"Yeah, and you tried to stop me doing my job, I know where you are, Traffic Controller, try anything else and we'll see whose job has no restrictions, yours or my job as a Council Spectre." Shepard growled, earning a squeal of terror from the other end of the line as the Normandy docked. He grinned and shook his head "Ya know, I probably could have sweet-talked him, but if their guns aren't that strong and we can beat them, best not to leave our asses open if they decide to turn on us later…" He told his squad, who were wondering if Shepard had been replaced, considering this was not his usual behaviour.

"Shepard, have you been feeling okay?" Liara asked bluntly.

"I'm fine, true, usually I'm not like this but I just can't stand corrupt corporate worlds no matter where they appear, always something rotten just under the surface… something we have to clean up. Come on, boys, let's go." The group then walked off the catwalk that had just been nanolathed between the Normandy's airlock and the dock itself, instead of using the provided docking entrance thingy, it wasn't like they were in space or anything, and there was a risk of an ambush from that extended thingy.

* * *

"A Spectre, a likely tale, firearms aren't allowed in Port Hanshan, please relinquish them or return them to your ship." The greeting party reached for the five-man group's weapons. The two humans were most likely sent by the Coalition to make sure the corporations didn't try any truly stupid-ass shit but Shepard's crew had no idea what the Turian was there for.

"Stop, now, the only firearm we carry on ourselves is Tali's flamethrower, do you understand that?" Shepard said authoritatively while Tali rubbed her visor in sadness that the universe had come to this sort of word joke.

"I think you know perfectly well what I mean, Commander Shepard."

"Look, we're here on Council business, I can't disclose why but we intend to do no harm to your facility, we only bring these weapons for self-defence."

"Yeah, like that Tomcat Autogun I spot on the Turian's back?" The Asian Captain commented sarcastically, pointing at one of Garrus's heavy weapons, the other one was an EMP pulse weapon that could be used for anti-shield or anti-Geth purposes if it came down to it. "I mean I can reasonably turn an eye when it comes to a couple pistols or even an SMG, though the Phasic" point at Tali's waist "is more like a carbine, but you can't expect to just take heavy weapons past me like that…"

"Stand Down, Captain Matsuo; we've confirmed that he's a Spectre here on Council business, let him be." A voice came over the loudspeakers, the Asian woman shrugged, then motioned for her officers to stand aside.

Once they'd reached the second landing, a series of alarms went off. "Don't worry, they're only weapons detectors" the voice from before said over the loudspeakers. "I'm Gianna Parasini, administrative assistant to Administrator Anoleis, I can give you some basic pointers about Port Hanshan if you'd like."

"Have there been any unusual guests lately?"

"Only one, an Asari Matriarch and an entourage of Commandos arrived recently and headed off to Peak 15's labs."

"Which Matriarch? Can you give me a name?" Shepard asked, frowning behind his helmet.

"I believe… Matriarch Benezia T'Soni, yep, that's her." The voice paused

"Liara, it seems…"

"Yes, Shepard, I knew this day would come, it's time to introduce you to my mother." Liara used a fake serious voice while saying this.

"Meet the parents, what a horrifying experience." Kaidan commented over comms.

"We'll get her back, Liara, we'll get her back from Saren, I promise you that."

"Don't make a girl a promise, if you know you can't keep it." Ashley said sagely, over his headpiece, Liara helmet-palmed at the statement.

"Ash, Kaidan, has Joker infected you with his very poor sense of humour?" That shut them up, at least for a moment.

"Anything else you want to ask, Shepard?" The PA asked after a long moment of silence, after all Gianna had to go get her hot chocolate, and since Shepard had gone silent, it had seemed a good opportunity to do so.

"How would we go about getting to Peak 15?" Shepard asked.

"Anoleis must approve any request to leave Port Hanshan."

"Hmm, that's annoying, and I don't want to leave the same way I came in…" Shepard paused for a moment "let's go see this Anoleis character…"

* * *

"Not surprising he was pretty pissed at the way the traffic controller forced our hand and he can't even really do anything against us…" Shepard commented.

"It would appear to be normal that he should we angry we blew up all of their defences, though I wonder who this Lorik Qui'in character is… I think that guy matches the description." Liara tagged the Turian in question with her HUD's tagging function.

"Are you Lorik Qui'in?" Shepard asked, sitting down opposite the Turian.

"Hmm, and what would you want Lorik for?" The Turian cocked his head.

"I'm looking to get out to Peak 15's labs, and I need a garage pass."

"That's me, though I must say I'm surprised you didn't just hold this installation at gunpoint with your ship and make them let you go." Lorik commented blandly. "After all, you cleared out ever defence tower that fired on your ship, as well as all the shield generators this installation had, simply because they would not let you land."

"This is a matter of galactic importance, Lorik, can you lend me your pass?"

"To the point, that's a nice trait, yes, but I need you to do something for me first…"

"What is it? If it's too outrageous…"

"No, no, it's just that." Lorik quickly leaned closer "Anoleis has become a corrupt administrator, he's been raising lab rent fees and pocketing everything he could, I have evidence in my office that will be able to take him down, it's on the data pad in the bottom drawer of my cabinet. However, Anoleis's men have evicted me from my office and I can't get the evidence I need."

Shepard nodded "Which office?"

"The Synthetic Insights office, I'm the administrator who deals with contracts with them and the maintenance of the labs and all that shit, after all." Lorik leaned back "Those were good days, Shepard, good battles, it was nice talking with you, oh, and in future battles, try to keep blood stains off the carpets…"

"Like that's likely, man, see ya!" Shepard waved as the squad crammed into the elevator "remind me… ugh… to take only two people with me next time, ooh…" He said as he tried to wedge himself into the wall. In the end, Wrex and Shepard had to hold their heavy weapons above their heads to make space.

Walking up toward the Synthetic Insights office, Shepard instructed his team "If possible, melee them and knock them out, and before you say that's weak, Wrex, it takes a lot more work than killing someone would."

After talking down the first two guards who simply left after Shepard charmed them into believing Anoleis was corrupt and that their pay would be higher if he was disposed of with the evidence inside. He would have mentioned longer life expectancy, but that would have been rude.

The squad took down the next two guards without trouble, simply meleeing them over the head, but the guards on the lower floors were more problematic. The upper level guards were compelled to come down when Wrex hewed the floor from under their feet with a volley of Gauss slugs, they and the catwalk fell down onto their compatriots below, screaming all the way.

The lower level guards were still fighting, despite a number of them being crushed under the catwalk. Tali's Sabotage, Shepard's Cloak and Melee combo, Garrus's overload and Liara's Throw dealt with them, knocking them out without killing them, ideally. Though of course the catwalk had squashed a few, it was nicer, and a lot more difficult, to keep most of them alive.

They thoroughly looted the place after making sure the guards were out with a couple extra whacks to the head. Then they looted Lorik's office, after all, why not? Then, they put the OSD Lorik had given them into his computer for the data transfer and decided to search outside for more loot. Unfortunately for their plan, they ran into another group of Port Hanshan guards, including the blond woman who had been so rude earlier when meeting the Normandy's shore party.

"Hello, Commander Shepard, did you do this?"

"They were corrupt, they had to be eliminated."

"Regardless, Shepard, even if they were corrupt, you're a cop-killer, Shepard, and we don't deal well with cop-killers here."

"Oh yes, because you're so high and mighty yourself." Ashley narrated "Shepard, can you try to keep the bitch alive so I can come by and show her what a real cop-killer would do?"

"Sorry, Ash, I can't do that." The firefight didn't take long after that, considering only the blonde woman had Coalition Civilian Armour, which was effectively the ultra-light variant with minimal other abilities besides a personal shield and structural fields "But I can loot the bodies for ya!" And so Shepard's team did, they thoroughly stripped the bodies of any useful goods and credits before moving on. "I'm not sure why we do that all the time, looting stuff, but hey, why not?"

"Personally, I never thought it's decent to loot the dead, Shepard" Liara said slowly, shaking her head.

Wrex turned and responded before Shepard could say anything "Liara, consider this, anyone who fights us is either stupid or on Saren's payroll. Killing the latter is business. Killing the former is a favour to the universe. Taking the enemy's funds is common sense, and besides, taking funds from people who can't use them properly is the same."

"I gotta agree with Wrex on this one, Liara, Besides, at least we're selling the weapons and stuff legally, not like anyone else salvaging it, they'll most likely put it on the black market to be sold to slavers and pirates to kill innocents with."

"I guess… yes, Shepard, I see your point now" The Asari nodded in agreement. "Besides, it's not like I haven't been participating in the looting." She grinned widely.

* * *

"Well, I guess I have a beer to collect sometime… Let's get to the garage and get out of this place." Shepard led the team toward the garage, they had Lorik's pass ready for the guards. They'd convinced the Turian to testify against Anoleis and Parasini had arrested the sneaky Salarian without further ado.

"Why are we even bothering with the garage, couldn't we just have flown the Normandy to Peak 15?" Liara pondered, and then looked back at Shepard "After we found out where my mother went, that is."

"We should respect the locals, Liara." Shepard's helmet lights showed he had grinned and winked at her. "After all, we've already exchanged our fair share of rudeness…" Liara rolled her eyes at that, her helmet lights rolling too to show her action.

"Geth!" Tali said in alarm as her Omni Sensor lit up with contacts once she'd turned it back on. "There are Geth in the garage, Shepard, be careful, patching through readings now."

Shepard stopped and projected the three-dimensional hologram of the garage for the team to see "I go in first, cloaked, and set off this crate" he pointed at a crate near the far end of the utterly empty garage, empty except for a number of Geth signatures, that is.

"Liara, I hope you can deploy a Singularity here." He tapped an area just inside the garage's entrance "Then move it to the far end in a straight line, picking up all the Geth, ideally." He turned to the Krogan "Wrex, Lift these explosive fuel canisters into Liara's singularity's path, stay behind cover, you two. Tali, set off an area Sabotage against the Geth, and use your SMG if you want. I'll cover for any Geth that manage to get past the Singularity, Garrus, pick anything the Singularity misses off. Wrex, once you finish with the containers, start emptying your Chaingun at them, everyone else, weapons free after that."

The plan went off without a hitch, by the time the three Destroyers, five Rocket Troopers and three Shock Troopers that survived the blast (which caught the few Troopers and a Rocket Trooper unawares) swivelled around again, the singularity that was barrelling along toward them had caught over half of them, and only the Destroyers and two shock troopers managed to dart to the sides of the garage before the gauss rounds Wrex spat out tore the fuel canisters apart and ignited their contents, with the net result of the Geth inside the Singularity's fields being ripped to bits. Garrus nailed one Shock Trooper through the head before it could do much, Shepard doing the same with the other. Tali's shotgun blasted a Destroyer with a double-tap right after she sabotaged its shotgun, disabling the weapon. Liara was whittling away at another Destroyer while Wrex pulled out his shotgun (the Chaingun was at best unwieldy on the move) and started blasting holes in the last Destroyer, in conjunction with the others.

After dealing with Captain Matsuo's inquiry about the Geth presence, informing her rather forcibly that THIS was why they'd brought heavy weapons into Port Hanshan, they called in the Restorer. The Gunship's Rhino tank would shuttle them over to Peak 15, seeing how there weren't any vehicles in the garage, and upon noting the blizzard outside, nothing to their suits, which were designed to withstand space for long periods i.e. until the user died of old age, but it would still be annoying to walk through. But of course, there was no way they were going to leave salvaging Geth materials for technology if they could help it. No one was sure why this was the case, since they didn't spend credits unless docked for shore leave in Council Space anyways, but it was, according to Shepard and his N7 manual, or at least the parts they were allowed to access, a good idea, assuming it did not jeopardize the mission, to salvage additional funds no matter the reason.

* * *

"Portable shield-wall emitters? Laughable." Shepard shook his head sadly, the things had completely shattered when the Rhino had ploughed through them, two Shock Troopers, three Rocket Troopers, and around a dozen Troopers that hadn't gotten out of the way, hemmed in by the Rhino's guns. Oh, and did I mention the Geth Turret that was now broken and charred metal under the Rhino's mighty tracks? The 8-meter-tall tank had a fairly short turret, only around 2.5 meters tall, that translated into 5 meter tall tracks, and of course, compared to the height of the Geth, it was no wonder that the Rhino had to depress its guns most of the time to fire on the Geth, or rove around and squash them if they got too close.

Surprisingly, the tunnel ahead actually fit the Rhino… sort of. They had absolutely NO room to manoeuvre, or even to turn the turret, excluding the Nanodart Launcher attached to the top as an upgrade. This wasn't a problem when it came to dealing with the four Geth Rocket Troopers that dared get in their way about halfway down the tunnel. Of course, there wasn't much left to pick up afterward, not even a Geth Pulse Rifle, but the two packages the Geth had been investigating would likely make them some good money, so they picked the stuff up and rolled on.

Upon emerging from the tunnel, the tank's albeit limited Radar picked up a Ground Vehicle signature and a number on Infantry Signatures. The Rhino's three Particle Cannons dealt with the Rocket Troopers before focusing on the Geth Colossus that blocked their way, finishing it with running it down. Then the team looted the area of all good before proceeding.

* * *

_Seven Geth Turrets, Four Armatures and a rather large number of Rocket Troopers Later…_

_Peak 15 Research Facility, Noveria, 6:00 PM Local Time, July 11, 3868_

"Thank God for all the upgrades I remembered to put on." Shepard said in relief "Didn't even take much structural damage, thanks to the Repair protocols, Hardened Over-shields and Personal Shields…" The tank finally pulled into the Peak 15 garage and stopped after blasting a few more Geth inside to oblivion. It was then set to Guard Mode before the squad bailed "Kaidan, get the SCU down and build a T3 SML, I have a feeling we'll need it."

"Aye, sir." Kaidan responded over the comm. "Need any units?"

"No, just the SML will do."

"Got it, the Normandy's moving out now" Kaidan stated before the line went dead. It wasn't unusual that the Normandy itself was required to drop off the SCU, considering the corvette was in fact shorter than a Continental, Vishala, or even a Star Lifter or Vish (which was effectively half of a Continental and Vishala respectively). The ship would drop the SCU somewhere secluded and then they could get back to Port Hanshan without getting challenged, considering all the defences had been reduced to smoking ruins courtesy of the Normandy's guns.

The group marched into the facility, keeping an eye on Tali's Omni Sensor feed at all times. They came across a large door leading from the room immediately adjacent to the garage, but when it swung open, they were treated to the sight of a number of Geth loitering around. They opened fire on the Geth Juggernaut first, then the Destroyer and Shock Troopers, until Tali noticed something wrong.

"Kill those repair drones!" Indeed, three drones were flitting around conducting field repairs on the other Geth platforms, the main reason the Juggernaut had not yet collapsed. The squad listened unhesitatingly and the drones went down in under two seconds, then the other Geth followed in short order.

When the last Geth hit the ground, courtesy of Tali's Phasic Shotgun and Wrex's Sonic Pulse Shotgun, six Krogan made their way into the room, charging the squad. Tali laid down a wall of white phosphorus fire but the second Krogan barrelled through it and rammed her into the wall, creating a dent and causing the shields of her armour to flare up for a moment, absorbing several more blasts from the angry reptile's shotgun before collapsing. The armour slowly lost its structural integrity fields from the battering and when it came down to it, Tali only managed to wedge her Phasic Shotgun into the Krogan's gut and hold down the firing stud after she was shot in the belly at point blank with the Krogan's shotgun.

The other squad members were busy dispatching their opponents while Tali was being beat up. Wrex was rolling around on the floor with the largest hostile Krogan, punching him in the face repeatedly and wielding his shotgun like a sword, while his opponent tried to keep up with the Battlemaster. Liara had picked up two of the Krogan and was pounding their faces to dust with warp after Warp, along with Phasic SMG and Laser SMG fire while Shepard covered her, using his Temporal Fizz Launcher to great effect against the Krogan that tried to charge her before putting a laser bolt through the enemy's head with his LBR. Then he picked the TFL off the ground again and looked for another target. Garrus was also quite preoccupied, one of the Krogan was trying to blast its way through his armour, but fortunately Garrus had enough sense to headbutt him. Suffice it to say that when a UEF Heavy armour attempts a headbutt, it's more of a case of the entire upper body swinging forward into you, and to any sentient, that's a lot of mass and momentum.

The Krogan reeled back only to have a lithe arm clad in white and green armour plates swing around its neck with a wickedly serrated knife and slice into its throat. The one shotgun blast Tali's armour had taken had not penetrated, but it had induced her armour to give her the standard combat stims mixture (dextro-amino edition) via hypospray. This enabled her to recover quickly from her dazed state and surge forward, grabbing onto the back of the Krogan much as a sabre-toothed tiger would grab onto a musk ox. After slashing the roaring beast several times in the neck, it finally threw her off just in time to receive a volley of Laser bolts to its face, along with gauss rounds from Garrus's GSMG. Tali's weapons, which she'd been firing into the Krogan even while she had been trying to slash its throat, had fried the Krogan's shield generators already; hence the Krogan's blood and brains now decorated Tali's armour.

"What's gotten into you, Tali?" Garrus asked as the slim Quarian dragged him upright with one effortless motion and then ran off far faster than he'd thought normal toward Liara's position where she helped toast the two remaining Krogan.

Once they'd finally finished, Tali responded, still talking extremely fast "I think the suit popped combat stims, you know those things Shepard told us about before?"

"You aren't injured though, Tali, according to my readings… oh." Shepard was frowning until Tali turned to face him, the spread of small impact marks in the lower abdominal armour suddenly obvious at the angle of lighting "How are the self-repair protocols doing?"

"They're fixing it, should be fine in a moment." Indeed, the holes were growing shallower as they watched. "Gotta ask, Shepard, do the stims only come online if your armour itself takes damage?"

"Usually, since long-term use is unhealthy, it's only used for melee combat scenarios…" Shepard was interrupted by the station VI. After raiding the area for goodies to "beam back" (blame Liara, she's been watching too much Star Trek) to the Normandy, they took the elevator up, then they promptly prepared to breach the cafeteria door. Tali's Omni Sensors had revealed a number of Geth signatures inside, so they were being careful.

It turned out there was no reason to be so cautious, after all, only about ten Troopers, Five Rocket Troopers and Five Shock Troopers greeted them. As planned, Wrex went for the Troopers with his Chaingun, cutting them all down in two seconds. Tali and Garrus dealt with the Rocket Troopers with Shotgun plus SMG or LBR work respectively, and Liara sent a Singularity into the small group of Shock Troopers near the other end of the Cafeteria, then she and Shepard opened up on the targets. The entire job, given the team's familiarity and skills with their Coalition-issue weapons, gave off an air of ludicrous ease.

"Ya know, this place seems to have taken a lot of damage from non-Geth guests too…" Tali looked around, seeing weapon marks not made by Geth or the squad "Maybe we should turn off the heat to kill anything that was released."

"Maybe, but I've seen plenty of organisms that would do just fine outside on Noveria" Liara responded, looking around and still holding her PSMG and LSMG by her sides loosely.

"Whatever boys, let's get up those stairs and find out why the hell the Geth were all facing the other way when we came in…" Shepard said "Though I have to agree, I've seen a lot of organisms that would do fine on Noveria."

"What the hell are those?" Garrus exclaimed as a literal wave of ant-like creatures, except for the fact that they were a lot larger than ants, swarmed down the stairs.

"Back UP!" Tali yelled as she raised her flamethrower, it was her standard weapon, even more so than her shotgun was, and unleashed a torrent of white phosphorus flame upon the enemy "Whatever they were… they're toast now." She said after the merry popping of the insectoid enemies' carapace had died down and the Omni Sensor showed only three threats up ahead, up the stairs, plus several much further away. Her team members could see the three up the stairs easily with their own Omni suites, but her boosted one could go much further, though most of the data was irrelevant for now anyways considering this was installation warfare.

Two Lifts from Liara and a Throw from Wrex, plus a healthy helping of Gauss, Phasic, Laser, and other weapons later, they finally realized that they had been fighting Rachni, AGAIN. Wrex thought back, it took him a while to dredge up the memory, but… "Hey, Shepard, those little green bugs, they're Rachni Workers, and they explode and spew toxins when they get close to ya."

"Good thing we have Tali, eh?"

After raiding the rooms in the hallway before the next elevator, the group would have, if it was not for Tali's Omni Sensor and their HUDs, been surprised by three more Rachni Soldiers that tried and utterly failed to impale them or spew acid onto them. The best thing about shields was that unlike armour, corrosion just doesn't work, so the Rachni were kicked, punched, shot and Warped to death in short order.

* * *

"Well, that VI wasn't so hard, was it?" Shepard grinned cockily, between Tali's tech prowess and Shepard himself interfacing with the VI core, it had taken mere moments to restore the VI Core to functionality. Then, they interrogated the VI, using the Secure Access afforded to Spectres, and found out that they'd have to reconnect two landlines on the roof of the installation as well as fix the Helium-3 fuel lines for the reactor. "Now let's get our asses up to the roof, who thinks we'll meet Rachni?" Wrex and Tali raised their hands "Geth?" Liara and Garrus raised their hands "I'd guess both or neither, by the way… we'll see, Tali, what's the Omni readout of the roof?"

"Well, there are numerous Rachni bio-signatures… No Geth ones."

"I should have remembered your Omni before I called the vote…" Shepard shook his head "Let's go toast some bugs, guys, fire at your HUD's target displays, Tali will be laying down fire to keep the workers away, so you'll have to rely on the targeting systems to identify targets through the fire and flames."

A series of affirmatives rang out in the slow elevator, until with a classic ding it opened up onto the roof's maintenance room. Shepard looked back at the team just before he swung the door open, clutching his GLMG in one hand and the door activation panel in the other. They nodded that they were ready, then he hit the open button. The door opened, and Tali was first out, laying down a 180-degree arc of fire as the Rachni Workers charged in a wave of green carapaced backs. They were reduced to ashes in seconds while Phasic, Laser and Gauss fire blazed through the flames into the ranks of the Rachni Soldiers, cutting them down one by one. When the last enemy on Omni sensors fell, Shepard set about fixing the landlines while the squad began looting the rooftop, as per tradition.

As soon as they finished with the rooftop, they took the elevator back to the VI core (Shepard scoffed at its size, a Coalition equivalent could fit inside a briefcase, most of the space taken up by cooling systems) and headed the other elevator. They used some combination of drop-kicking, punching, clubbing, biotics (the main reason the aforementioned melee attacks were possible without taking damage) and good old fashioned weapons fire to take down the Rachni soldiers that emerged from a vent to their left and behind them.

* * *

"I don't like this… Tali, what's Omni giving you?" Standard suit Omi Sensors had a 100-m range, but Tali's boosted suite had a 250-meter range (only half the helmet was dedicated to the upgrade), the most upgraded ones could pull off 400 meters, not including standard Radar arrays that went to 500, 750 and 1000 meters on the different grades of Omni Sensors.

"Omni says there are numerous Geth signatures in the area, as well as ambient radar jamming fields, which aren't having an effect on the Omni." Tali said, holding her shotgun securely before her and advancing cautiously along with everyone else, her left arm circuitry lines glowing slightly brighter than normal with the already-prepared AI Hacking, Overload and Sabotage algorithms and logic bombs.

"Ah, so that's why…" Shepard motioned toward Tali's shotgun, if it had been organic or sort-of-organic foes she would have been using her flamethrower for sure. "Alright, I got the data feed, here's the plan." He drew up the scanner results for the core room. "Liara, can you pull this Juggernaut over this ledge? That should do some damage, Garrus, snipe the thing before she pulls it and then after it's on the ground, Wrex, deal with the Destroyers, Tali, use an area overload on any clusters of Geth you spot, I'll slow down these Hoppers for you. After you do your task, weapons free."

A round of affirmatives came right before Tali opened the door. Liara was first to fire, though Garrus's laser bolt passed her biotic field in-flight and hit the Juggernaut's shields first. The Destroyers came under a volley of shotgun fire as they charged, courtesy of Wrex, and hit by Lift fields from Liara and the Krogan Battlemaster. The Hoppers were slowed in time as their masses attracted the Chronotron distortions characteristic of Temporal Fizz Launchers; giving Tali ample time to kill them with Overload algorithms and Shotgun work, as they hadn't quite come close enough for flamethrower work to be terribly efficient.

Garrus's second sniper mode laser bolt smashed through the head of the Juggernaut before it could get up but not before its own rocket smashed into Garrus' over-shield, cutting the strength of the protective bubble by about half. The Geth went down as its processors had been fried, and Garrus turned his attention toward the other Geth. One of the Destroyers was already down and dead thanks to Wrex's shotgun, while the other two were being warped to pieces by Liara's mind. Wrex had taken one look at the Asari and decided to help Tali out with the slight infestation fo Geth Hoppers, leaving Liara to have fun on her own.

After the last of the Geth were down, the area was thoroughly looted, and the couple pesky Rachni Soldiers that emerged from yet another grate were hewed to pieces of badly butchered meat, the group decided to repair the plasma vents. It would burn the horde of Rachni Soldiers that were apparently infesting a part of the station, as opposed to taking them on. It was just getting too tedious to kill them face-to-face, besides, it wasn't like they were getting exp or credits from the kills, were they? (Blame Garrus, he has been playing too many RPGs)

* * *

The rest of the mess (aka Rift Station) was one long slog of making a bioweapon cure, confronting an Asari who worked for Saren, killing her and her Geth helpers, and getting through a long series of doors and hallways down toward the Hot Labs. This was until Shepard stopped just short of the final door into the hot lab they were concerned with.

"Tali, what's behind that door?"

"I'm detecting one enormous Rachni signature near the middle the room and an Asari signature near one side, on an elevated area. Other Asari and Geth signatures are scattered about in the side rooms, probably ready to ambush us if need be." Tali had projected a schematic of their next combat area. She tapped the areas of interest before looking up at Shepard "There's nothing else, Shepard, no other potential hostiles detected on Omni nearby."

"Alright, Garrus, keep an eye on that door, the rest of us, loot this part of the station, check all the rooms, whoever authorized this entire mess is as Wrex said stupid or working for Saren, liberating credits from the latter is business, liberating credits from the former is a favour to the universe." Shepard ordered, the team fanned out, moving in pairs, inevitably, Liara and Shepard worked together, leaving Tali and Wrex to work together.

* * *

A/N: Is it just me or does the ME Wiki shot of Mira, Peak 15's VI look like Cortana from Halo?

The next chapter is going to be one of the number one facepalm-at-Council devices (and plot devices) you can think of, guess what it will be (Hint: It has to do with the new heavy weapon Joker mentioned…)

REVIEW!


	24. Resistance Is Futile

A/N: In which Benezia is HIT BY A CAR, literally.

Thanks to RoyalTwinFang's VERY kind review… I have decided to actually add a Codex entry in this fic, which I believe is only the second time here, though entries have appeared in Koprulu Sector on a regular basis. I know the combat's getting a bit boring (like watching a Spartan from Halo battling a bunch of Grunts, way too "Power Overwhelming", but hey that's the fact of the matter), but ACU warfare will come up again in short order i.e. VIRMIRE (in about 2 or 3 chapters, and you know me, I work reasonably fast).

I almost feel sorry for Saren on Virmire, almost, I think I'll give him and the Krogan Army some Reaper-issue Infantry Weapons to help, but it won't be much, that's for sure.

* * *

Chapter 24: Resistance is Futile

"Is that Benezia?" Shepard asked Liara as they took cover behind some crates.

She nodded "Yes, that's mum, unless she's changed a lot over the last couple years, well, she does look a bit gaunt from here, but that's Benezia, for sure." Liara's mother once had a more rounded, youthful face (Asari have never been recorded to aesthetically age significantly, much to the surprise of most races coming into contact with them), now it was more gaunt and aged.

Shepard nodded acknowledgement and stepped out of cover, approaching the Matriarch's platform with his team following his example. Wrex was a bit hesitant but then decided to trust Shepard's judgement on the matter "Hello, there, are you Matriarch Benezia?" Wrex facepalmed at what Shepard had said, wondering if the Commander had finally gone off his rocker, that cheerful tone was almost comical… almost.

Benezia turned her head slightly toward them, still with her body facing the enormous creature in the containment tank before her "You do not know the privilege of being a mother… There is power in creation," She looked toward the creature again "to shape a life, turn it toward happiness or despair. Her children were to be ours," She looked at them for another moment before looking back to the creature "raised to hunt and slay Saren's enemies." She then turned away from the console and took two steps toward the edge of the elevated platform, toward Shepard's crew. "I won't be moved by sympathy, no matter who you bring into this conversation…"

Shepard frowned "Liara's here because she wants to be, not because I asked her to."

Benezia tilted her head slightly "Indeed? What have you told him about me, Liara?"

"What could I say, mom? That you're insane? Evil? Should I explain how to kill you? What could I say?" Liara was waving her arms about in exasperation, Garrus was busy recording it for future "So you think you can dance" material, until Shepard glared at him through blood-red optics and he hurriedly turned the recording function off.

Benezia moved further toward them "Have you faced an Asari commando unit before? Few humans have…"

Shepard shook his head sadly "I can't believe you'd kill your own daughter…"

"I now realize I should have been stricter, Liara." Benezia said before she glowed with biotic energy and covered all five of Shepard's crew with Stasis, giving time for a squad of commandos to take up positions.

"It is truly wonderful that our armour is the only affected by these stasis fields, guys, I'm setting our weapons to IFF rounds, they'll knock the Asari out with their training rounds, but if they identify a Geth in the sights they'll auto-switch to lethal munitions. Be careful, I have a solution to this whole mess… without killing anyone besides Geth." Coalition armour was designed to be NBCP protected, Nuclear, Biological, Chemical, and Psychic, including Psionics, Biotics, etc. in the last category. "Weapons free!"

Wrex decided to sort-of-abstain from shooting anyone, because like most Krogan if he shot at something that something had a tendency to die even from non-lethal rounds. He did help soak up some fire for Tali though, and distracted the Commandoes by street dancing out of cover (this was from sheer boredom as well as curiosity, plus Krogan recklessness), relying on his shielding to keep him safe. Needless to say, the first squad of six half-stunned Commandos did not take all that long to take down with the superior firepower of Coalition weapons. Even set on non-lethal, they could still pack a big punch, in addition to deploying anaesthetics, both gas and liquid, on impact.

Benezia (and the Commandos) was throwing biotics attacks at them throughout the battle, which resulted in Tali being thrown into a stack of crates and them falling on her, Wrex flying around the battlefield like a large projectile, and other unpleasant effects. Though one good thing came out of it, when Wrex used his own biotics to counter the effect somewhat he took down the last of the first Commando wave by hitting her over the head a little too hard, knocking her out.

Benezia then used stasis on the whole crew again, then called in a wave of Geth and Commandos, throwing tech attacks such as Overload or Sabotage at the squad once the Matriarch terminated the Stasis fields. Thanks to over-shields and shields, the strikes did absolutely nothing except irritate the crew. Garrus fired his LBR at the Geth Snipers, happy to not be stuck using his Gauss SMG anymore, while Wrex left a trail of wrecks. Geth platforms were stomped, melees, shot and blasted to bits while the team held off the Commandos, matching their biotics and bullets with their own pulses, bolts and rounds (all on non-lethal setting), plus Dampening and their own biotics.

Once this wave was mostly down, another wave of Geth and Commandos flooded the room. Thanks to the large number of Geth, Wrex finally had a chance to use his favourite weapon, the Gauss Chaingun. They were mown down like wheat by the powerful rounds, which were effectively assault cannon shells. The Commandos got better treatment, though it took a long time before the last went down soundlessly, having taking a shot to the head, the anaesthetic soaking into her skin and entering through her nose.

The group assembled before Benezia's platform, which had extended toward the tank holding the creature. Shepard tapped his foot impatiently "Well, your help is down, got anything for us?"

"This… is not over, Saren is unstoppable…" Benezia said, standing despite her wounds, though as they were from reflected laser bolts or ricocheting gauss round fragments they were not too serious. "My mind is filled with his light!" She turned back toward the tank where the creature rested "Everything is clear…"

"It doesn't have to be this way, Benezia, tell us, what's Saren's next move?"

"I will not betray him, you will… you…" Shepard had the distinct impression that something was up and that if he was going to use his secret weapon he'd better do it soon. "You must listen, Saren still whispers in my mind, I can fight his compulsions briefly, but the indoctrination is strong…"

Shepard understood now what had happened "We met Shiala on Feros, she told us about Sovereign's indoctrination."

"It is a terror to be trapped in your mind, to beat upon the glass as your hands torture and murder… I was powerless, nothing but a tool for Saren. He sent me here to find the location of the Mu Relay, its position was lost thousands of years ago."

Shepard raised an eyebrow, his helmet optics miming the motion "How does something that big go missing?"

"Four thousand years ago a star nearby went supernova, the shockwave propelled the Relay out of its system, but did not damage it, its precise vector and speed were impossible to determine, as millennia passed, the nebula created by the supernova enveloped the Relay." She paused "It is difficult to find any cold object in interstellar space, particularly something swathed in hot dust and radiation."

Shepard didn't quite get the point of this information "So someone on Noveria found it?"

"The Rachni once inhabited that region of the galaxy, they discovered the relay, the Rachni can share their memories across generations, Queens inherit the knowledge of their mothers." Shepard stiffened, so this was where all the Rachni were coming from, this queen… "I took the location of the Relay from the Queen's mind… I was not gentle."

Shepard had glanced at Liara in time to see her flinch slightly, then put a hand on her shoulder pauldron in a gesture of comfort. Liara herself was shocked that her mother, one of the most respected Matriarchs, would commit what was the Asari equivalent of rape. Mind-rape was said to be a horrific experience for the receiver, and she shuddered subconsciously despite Shepard's comforting hand on her shoulder. Despite this, she understood, the indoctrination Shiala and her mother had described was powerful enough, she only felt sorry she had not tried harder to dissuade her mother when she decided to try to turn Saren from the destructive path he had embarked on a while back. In fact, Liara had not tried to dissuade her mother at all, feeling that her mother knew to do what was right and appropriate.

Shepard looked at Liara for a long moment, checking if she was alright or not, before turning back to Benezia. He had a very good idea what Liara was thinking, a forced interface of implants among Cybrans, or a forced melding among the Seraphim or psionic members of the Aeon Illuminate or UEF was very similar to what Benezia had done. In all three societies, it was considered rape. Meanwhile, he delegated more of his mind to processing the next problem, leaving that one to simmer and slowly get dealt with "How did the Rachni find it?"

"They searched, patiently." Shepard froze his helmet expression to be polite and rolled his eyes, that was obvious "They are territorial creatures, driven to close any possible way into their systems." Well, alright, he could visualize it as a swarm of ants or bees looking for food.

"What does Saren need the Mu Relay for?"

"He believed it would lead him to the Conduit, I would tell you more if I could, but Saren did not share his counsel with me. I was merely a servant to his cause."

"You can still make things right, Matriarch, give me the information."

"I was not myself… but I should have been stronger." She walked toward them, holding a disk in her hand "I transcribed the data to an OSD, take it, please!" Shepard did as she asked and took the disk "There isn't much time… I transmitted the coordinates to Saren before you arrived." She looked down, one eye twitching erratically "You have to stop me, I… can't, his teeth are at my ear," the Matriarch's voice was growing desperate, though Shepard took a moment to wonder what she meant by ear as the Asari had no real external ears, though the ridges along the back of their head, on the underside, functioned similarly in gathering sound toward their auditory canals, as he'd discovered on Liara (she thought his external ears were very interesting, though when she tugged a little too hard it was slightly painful for him) "fingers at my spine," She seemed to be almost clawing at her headdress, bent over in pain before the console she'd moved back toward "you should…"

Liara finally unfroze and moved forward, Shepard's hand sliding off her armour's shoulder pauldron when she did "Mom, don't leave! Fight him!"

Benezia turned toward her daughter one last time "You've always made me proud, Liara." Then she tensed and shuddered for a moment before her control failed and her biotics flared higher than any Shepard had yet seen "DIE!"

Shepard raised the heavy weapon he'd been holding in his hands as the tide of energy battered against their over-shields and wore them down alarmingly fast, throwing off his aim somewhat. This was until Liara threw up a Barrier and he acted, firing the heavy weapon into Benezia at what was effectively point-blank range with a war cry of "Resistance Is Futile!" She stumbled back slightly with the impact of the round but kept up the assault, frowning in concentration and disbelief that Liara's Maiden-stage biotics could have a hope of resisting her power for any duration of time. Liara's Barrier eventually shattered under the strain and their armour began blaring over-shield depletion alarms at them or in Tali's case an alarm that told her that her personal shields were below half strength. Finally the round began to take effect and she fell, breathing harshly.

"What… is that, Shepard?" Garrus asked, looking at the weapons and the Matriarch who was down and out on the ground.

"A CAR, in other words, Cybran Assimilation Rifle, this is the newest thing I persuaded Brackman into authorizing research into, it won't work on any Coalition member or in the case of Humans and Seraphim the whole species, unless the standard resistance genes and defensive abilities including psionics and mental barriers are down." Shepard said, walking over to the fallen Matriarch, Liara right beside him. "In her case and in the case of any indoctrinated Asari it should work just fine."

"What does it do, exactly? Mom seems to still be alive." Liara was kneeling down and watching her mother carefully, afraid to touch her in case she made something worse.

"Liara, remember watching Star Trek with us? That line Shepard used, 'Resistance Is Futile', sound familiar?" Tali prompted.

"Oh, so, is my mother going to become…" Liara hoped not… "Why does it only work on Asari and Quarians?"

"No, she won't turn into a monster obsessed with absorbing others into the Borg Collective, unless you think I'm a monster." Shepard's optics twinkled as he smiled, then he took off his helmet "The only races it's been configured to work on so far are Asari and Quarians, since Human physiology is almost absurdly similar to yours. We should move Benezia once the assimilation process has stabilized. Don't worry, we won't go around assimilating every Asari and Quarian, because the only way this weapon can work is if the mental barriers are down and the deepest subconscious welcomes release from the shackles of indoctrination, though I fear your mother's going to have those circuits for the rest of her life." Indeed, thin orange and red lines of Cybran circuitry had begun to appear on the edges of Benezia's face, now bearing a peaceful expression as opposed to her earlier, furious one. "The Loyalty Program in the software package will take over from any other sort of mind control known thus far and install all necessary Firewall and Antivirus components and software into the brain. Then, it will be flushed out of the system by the Cybran Liberation Matrix, leaving your mother free, though her body may take a few weeks in med bay to recover from the ordeal." Nihlus Kryik had sent a week in the Normandy's med bay before deciding to take a long vacation on an Aeon planet, swearing upon his Turian Honour not to spy or attempt to remove any Coalition technology from said planet. He hadn't called Shepard in a while, but his last request had been to if at all possible find out why his old friend who loved jokes would try to shoot him in the head.

"It is most certainly a useful weapon, Shepard." Wrex commented. "Perhaps we should secure all the Commandos first, make sure they don't just try to shoot us in the back…"

"You're right… what's that?" A Commando had stumbled toward the tank, zombie-like in her stiff motions.

"We sing through this one, she has colours we have no names for, but her song is quiet for now, resting, we would ask you, what do you plan for us?" The Asari said, clearly not herself.

"You are the Rachni Queen?" Shepard asked.

"Look Shepard, controls for those acid tanks, if we release those, we'll have gotten rid of the Rachni for good this time." Wrex commented, pointing at the relevant section of the console.

"And there's the controls to release her, killing a species off isn't right, Shepard." Liara said, countering Wrex's statement, pointing at another section of the console.

"Yes, what is to happen to us? Are we to be let free, to compose anew, or are we to be consigned forever to silence?"

"If I let you free, how can I we sure we won't end up with another Rachni War on our hands?" Shepard asked, narrowing his eyes at the large creature.

"I do not know of the wars, I was only an egg then, listening as hive after hive was silenced by a sour yellow note from space, as the Queens were forced to resonate to its tune. The Rachni are not an aggressive race by nature, it is that sour yellow note that brought about the war, at least, that was what I had perceived…"

"That sounds like indoctrination, I hope you have enough experience to resist the note if it comes again, I'm letting you free." He hit the necessary controls and the tank moved toward the ceiling, where it linked up to an opened gateway to the outside. "By the way, be careful, we're planning to drop a strategic nuke on this place to cleanse it soon, hurry."

The Rachni Queen turned her eyes toward the team, and spoke through the Asari "I understand, it is truly sad, but my children… it is impossible to help them, fear has shattered their minds… Thank you, Shepard, for this chance for us to compose anew. We will sing of your forgiveness to our children, should you need assistance, as you Humans would say, 'give us a call'."

"By the way, if you want, we have a ride for you, to get you to a safe place in time."

"We would be grateful for that, Shepard." The queen said after a moment of surprise.

"Kaidan, get a Chariot LAT (Light Air Transport) out here ASAP, we're helping a Rachni Queen rebuild her race."

The comms activated again "Understood sir, I was expecting you to say something like that, it'll be there in a minute, just tell her to wait outside."

"The ride will be outside in a minute, please wait outside, be careful not to fall off the edge, a Chariot Light Air Transport is like a flying disc." Shepard nodded at the Queen before she nodded her head and turned and moved out of the containment tank into the wilds of Noveria, to wait for the ride that would soon come to pick her up. The controlled Asari Commando sat down and laid down, completely unconscious once more.

Shepard and crew set about binding the Commandos and putting Benezia into a medical capsule they'd summoned from the Normandy's inventory. It would take her back to the ship, which it did… now the problem was what to do with the Commandos. Scans told them none of them were indoctrinated, they had simply been following their teacher. Shepard looked up at the empty containment tank that plugged into the wall outlet "It would be nice if they'd brought us some stuff for this sort of thing, like a very long ladder… right!" He brought in a bunch of stim-packs from the Normandy's inventory, with the net result that all the Commandos were awake within a few moments. When confronted with the truth of the matter, they agreed to not fight the squad until they could meet their teacher again, a few conditions were asked of Shepard's crew, but those were inconsequential.

* * *

"That's stupid, using a neutron purge? Who knows what might survive, if we survive during our escape, couldn't Rachni?" Shepard scoffed, looking pointedly at the rather large crew of Asari commandos they'd picked up pointedly when referring to surviving during the escape, their shields would keep out the neutron purge just fine, but not so for the Commandos.

"And that's a crapload of Rachni between us and the tram back to the Peak 15 station." Wrex said, pointing with his Gauss Chaingun as the squad let rip, relying on the Commandos for biotics, since the disparity between the firearms was simply too great for the Commandos' guns to be very effective for fire support. Thankfully, there were enough Commandos to provide adequate biotic support against the milling horde of Workers, Soldiers and Brood Warriors, not that much was needed with Coalition infantry weapons.

Once they'd cleared the mob away, they scrambled into the tram and then made their way through the Peak 15 station to the rooftop, where the Restorer waited patiently for them to board. "Is that a shuttle or a frigate?" One commando asked, looking at the 40-meter-long, sleek white-and-green Gunship.

"It's a Restorer T3 AA Gunship, used by the Coalition as a shuttle and a combat unit. Trials have shown that it can take on a frigate one-on-one and have a pretty decent chance of winning, though a Geth Dropship will be a slight challenge one-on-one." Shepard announced proudly as the boarded and the airlock cycled closed for the last time. "All our air units have been modified to be Aerospace capable, and have far more fuel, speed and range than back in the Infinite War and Seraphim War."

The commandos just nodded mutely until a hollow thump rang through the hull. "What was that?"

"We just picked up our Rhino Medium Tank from where we parked it." Shepard informed them.

"But it sure didn't feel like we moved…"

"Inertial manipulators and Mass Adjustors do that on all Coalition units, or the acceleration would crush you to the deck."

A few moments later, Shepard's computers showed they were at a safe distance and so was the Rachni Queen from the installation "Kaidan, drop the nuke, then reclaim everything and get your ass back to the Normandy, we'll dock with you shortly."

"Got it, sir." Kaidan said over the Restorer's PA. Then a female voice intoned ominously "Strategic Launch Detected."

"We're cleaning the labs." Shepard explained to the Commandos.

* * *

"I hope your decision to let that Queen go doesn't come back to bite us in the ass, Shepard." The Turian Councillor growled.

"If I'd killed the critter you'd be angry at me for committing genocide while you happily did it to the Krogan after they helped save your asses. I hope that if it comes back, the only ass it'll bite is yours, karma's a bitch, Councillor, don't forget that."

"Enough, Velarn, stop this right now." The Asari had shown a spark of anger, enough to make the Turian back down. "I am concerned, did you retrieve Matriarch Benezia or not? She needs to stand trial for what she did, helping a traitor."

"No, we were forced to kill her." He felt perfectly comfortable lying to this bunch of scumbag politicians.

"That is a shame, well, Spectre, good luck on your mission, we will contact you if we have further intel on Saren's movements, Council, out."

Shepard rubbed his temples right after the holograms winked out.

* * *

On the other side of the galaxy, in the Serpent Nebula, in the Council Chambers of the Citadel, an Asari's booted foot met a Turian's butt rather forcefully right before a Turian was lifted bodily into the air by his collar. "ARE YOU PHYSICALLY CAPABLE OF NOT IRRITATING SHEPARD?" She screeched, while the Turian leaned as far back as he could from the imposing blue woman (who was also glowing blue), narrowed his eyes against the oncoming wind, and thanked whatever powers that be that he didn't have hair. His fringe wouldn't need to be restyled, though he had a feeling his facial patterns may need to be reapplied before he could head outside again. This feeling was magnified by the fist that met his face moments later.

Armin looked on and shrugged, perhaps it wouldn't be wise for him to intervene unless Velarn was at risk of dying, oh well. Regardless, he turned his Omni-tool to record the video footage, it would be excellent blackmail material.

* * *

In the chambers where Dr. Brackman's brain tank resided, a display of the quantum fabric of the universe spiked for a moment due to the minute quantum fluctuation detected on the Citadel, then slowly settled down again. "What the hell?" It was probably the first time the Doctor had cursed in over a thousand years.

* * *

Startled by the sound while taking a bath, President Hall narrowly avoided drowning from falling asleep in his bathtub, he climbed out of the tub and towelled himself off before going back to his bed. He wondered briefly what had happened for a woman to yell in such a loud voice…

* * *

Shepard blinked and stuck his little finger in his ear to extract earwax; he could have sworn he'd just heard the Asari Councillor yelling something… a very odd occurrence considering the Citadel was across the galaxy from where he was now…

* * *

COALITION MILITARY CODEX: CYBRAN ASSIMILATION RIFLE

(BASIC CLEARANCE)

Unsurprisingly, Science Fiction has acted as a catalyst for many inventions through history, this is one of them. Inspired by the Borg Collective from Star Trek, the Cybrans have derived from the basic Cybran Nanites a system which can turn a non-Cybran into a Cybran. It was originally (before the founding of the Cybran Nation, in the old Earth Empire) used to stabilize terminally ill patients, or, if all else failed, facilitate the installation of a mostly prosthetic body in critical instances such as an attempted murder of a witness to a crime. Over the years, the Cybrans discovered that assuming the Assimilator Nanites had a Loyalty Program package in them, they could be used to extract information from hostile infiltrators, though the Cybran Liberation Matrix is also always included, to be triggered when the user of the Assimilator Nanites deems it appropriate or, if the option is selected before the process completes, upon completion of assimilation.

The technique had been found to work without exception against all known forms of psychic, psionic or other mind control techniques. Please note that the basic self-defence techniques of Human and Seraphim minds will resist the process unless the target is either compromised or unconscious. All the ingrained firewalls and antiviral routines of any Cybran will also annihilate the Assimilators, for some odd reason. Doctor Brackman refused to take research further into making the Assimilation process more forceful, it had stretched even his broad ethical boundaries as is. Weaponizing the technology was as far as he was willing to take it, that and expand the range of species it could deal with.

Attempts to make the nanites compatible with Drell physiology were put aside after the Turian War in favour of simulations run against sensor data from body scans of Asari, Quarians and Turians. None of the scanned tourists were harmed in any way, shape or form, but it was found that Asari and Quarian physiology was effectively identical to human physiology in most ways, hence, the Cybran Assimilator Rifle was finally released to Coalition N7 Marines. The initial iteration only carried the necessary programming to assimilate Asari and Quarians, though more research is expected to soon turn up a functional programming set for use against Turians, since it has been found that dextro-amino races can also be affected, and the Turians are more of a concern than say, the Drell, would likely be.

Addendum: Due to the fact that the weapon is more often known as "CAR", N7 Marines and any who have heard of it have more or less unanimously voted to term the targets "Road kill" or "Street Pizza". This is most noted for making Dr. Brackman laugh for the first time anyone has witnessed in, well, a while, a LONG while.

END OF CODEX ENTRY

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE GIVE HIGHER CLEARANCE LEVEL CODES OR GO TO NANITE MEDICINE, HEAVY WEAPON, N7 MARINE OR CYBRAN.

* * *

_High Orbit over Procyon, Two Days Later_

_If only we had this sort of thing back in the Rebellions…_ Wrex thought as he looked toward the Quantum Beam Generator that made up the defence station's main armament, working in conjunction with four banks of scaled-up Temporal Fizz Launchers, Zealot SIM launchers and other weapons. Shepard was giving the non-Coalition crew a guided tour of one of the light defence stations in orbit of Procyon as a treat while Benezia and her disciples were transported to the surface. They'd decided to do so because Procyon had the best equipment and expertise for dealing with this sort of thing. It was, after all, the first use of the Rifle in the field.

"Shepard, I think this automated defence station resembles one of those CZARs you mentioned in the past…" Liara said, looking around. Shepard broke off his explanation of the Quantum Beam Generator to smile at her.

"Yep, it's a glorified CZAR facing AWAY from the planet in High Orbit"

"So that's why it seems so familiar…" Liara said in realization, clapping a hand to her forehead. "How could I have forgotten?"

"We made all our air units besides Torpedo Bombers able to fight in space, and the Torpedo Bombers can still fly in space if needed." Shepard explained "I wouldn't have expected it either." He patted her shoulder pauldron comfortingly.

"So what's these things' combat doctrine?" Garrus asked, firepower wasn't nearly as important as knowing how to use it, assuming no enormous disparity.

"Evasive manoeuvres are standard fare, and it orients itself to keep the Beam pointed at the enemy. It's set to Engage Strongest up to about Battle Cruiser size, above that, it's Cull Weakest. The Fizz Launchers and Zealots keep away most fighters and small ships fairly well, and it provides aerospace staging, refuel and repair as you can see." A Continental on long-distance freight duty with its cargo—quantum gating was simply too energy intensive for food transport with it to be economical—docked with the disc-like station, obtained the fuel it needed, and lifted off again, headed toward the other side of Procyon. Sure, it could make the flight well enough without refuelling, but this way was a great deal faster.

"Why do they need fuel?" Tali asked "I mean your Rhino's reactor deals with it just fine…"

"It is true that vehicle reactors can propel them just fine, however fuel allows a more concentrated release of energy in a shorter time, hence we still use fuel for aircraft." Shepard explained, this was going to be a long day…

* * *

A/N: Does anyone think the Infestors from Starcraft 2 resemble Rachni Queens, at least from the Wiki photos? INCLUDING MIND CONTROL CAPABILITIES!

Also, do Roaches bear a resemblance to Brood Warriors? INCLUDING THE ACID ATTACK!

I can just see the Codex entries for those… *shakes head*

Anyways, sorry this is a short chapter, if I'd realized how little there actually would be t the Noveria fight I'd have merged the two chapters… but then the Title wouldn't reveal that it is Noveria…


	25. Wrex, Garrus, and Liara's New Powers

A/N: I am quite sure I have described the Coalition space fleet and factories and all that before… have I not? Oh well, I will reiterate things near the end of this chapter, as much of the chapter takes place on or near Procyon, the Cybran Capital world.

THERE IS A CODEX ENTRY NEAR THE END OF THIS CHAPTER!

Also, I know the heroes end up hideously OP-ed but even against other RTS games SupCom is just absurd. SupCom: KS proves as much, also, what can match up to the Coalition (within reason)? If I tried to establish a stable wormhole to the Star Wars galaxy, THEY HAVE YET TO GET PAST INFANTRY SQUARES!

Rant about SupCom superiority up ahead, also spoilers for SupCom: The Reclaimers.

Find one RTS that can match up to SupCom ground-wise, and don't try saying the Covenant from Halo, if the space weapons from Halo were that powerful those two plasma torpedoes striking the Pillar of Autumn in that cutscene (where you are escaping) would have vaporized it. If those were effective anti-ship weapons in the Covenant then MAC guns would be one-hit-kill even against shields if they really were teratons yield, since they require multiple shots then the Covenant weapons must also be near-teraton yield which means the Pillar of Autumn would have been vaporized. Since this did not occur, one can conclude that all weapons in Halo are at most medium Kiloton level (100 or so kilotons for the Plasma Projectors used to glass planets will suffice, it is in fact possible to do that) therefore Halo would not stack up. Also, the UNSC ships would have gone flying and pin wheeling every time they fired their MAC guns, which are clearly not lined up with their center of mass.

Btw a Wraith Mortar Tank is approximately equal to a Fervour Mobile Light Artillery in shot damage, but overall DPS-wise it is more along the lines of a Light Assault Bot, and is ridiculously fragile. You can punch through with what is basically a 21st century Heavy Machine Gun aka the Warthog LAAG for gods' sake (though it takes a while)! That makes it on par in durability with a Spirit Land Scout! (Makes sense, as the Scorpion Tank's gun is much, MUCH weaker than a Striker's, which does 24 damage per shell compared to a Sprit's 23 Health.)

Though according to lore a Scarab is 9 meters tall and has ship-grade plasma cannons on the front. I can make that fairly strong but I will need it to be much, MUCH bigger to make it match up to a Siege Assault Bot or Harbinger Heavy Armour (35 meters tall). Btw speed-wise SABs can get up to 100 m/s will full upgrades, though this increases their construction energy cost… Heavy Armour i.e. Harbingers and Othuums can get up to 70 and 60 m/s respectively, and Armoured Assault Bots can only pull 40 m/s (50 for the Brick). The tougher a T3 unit is, the slower it is.

End Rant

* * *

Chapter 25: Wrex, Garrus, and Liara's New Powers

_Procyon, Cybran Capital World, July 17, 3868_

"So you and Wrex have some things from your past that you'd like to get cleared up?" Shepard asked. They'd dropped Benezia and her disciples here for the time being, since they were all apparently wanted in Citadel Space, and left them to deal with their own problems. Doctor Brackman and the other Coalition leaders promised the Asari group asylum from the Council until they could get their names cleared, something which Shepard assured them would eventually happen with the whole Reaper mess. He'd then been drawn into a conference where certain facts were revealed to him… but that was a tale for another day. Sadly for Liara her mother was still out like a light and being monitored, it was to be expected though, since the older the mind got the longer it took to become accustomed to Cybran implants or other prosthetics.

"That about sums it up, Shepard" Garrus said, looking out over the skyline of Procyon, which had once been a lush, beautiful planet but was now a red, dusty desert, slowly being terraformed back to its former glory. "It is amazing what your people have achieved here, Shepard, truly amazing."

"You do remember the guided tour of one of the orbital "light" defence stations, right? Those things were wonderful…" Wrex said dreamily next to them, causing Liara to stare at him for a moment before Tali whacked him upside the head with her shotgun. Shepard rolled his eyes and thought: _If you thought a CZAR was wonderful I'm not going to take you to see a Yolona Oss, it might break you, and nanolathing is not known to repair broken Krogan_.

"Please do not use a dreamy voice again, Wrex, I can't stand when a Krogan does that. And before you ask me why you shouldn't use your dreamy voice, I have a flamethrower…" Tali told the Krogan, who was rubbing his head plate in irritation.

Liara and Shepard were having their own conversation while the other three bickered, holding hands and looking out at the airbuses flying by, to reduce congestion, all Coalition worlds had aerial walkways and airbuses, but air cars were banned from the most densely built areas of cities. She leaned her head on his shoulder, for once clothed in a shirt as opposed to his usual Cybran Heavy armour, after a long, comfortable silence, she spoke up "I was hoping we could spend more time alone here, Shepard, but the mission comes first, doesn't it… at least unlike some militaries I've heard of the Coalition doesn't discourage relationships on ships."

"The past few days were like a dream, Liara, after the mission, we can go visit Seraphim II and Earth if you'd like, see some of the sites, especially Earth, some of the old cultural heritage sites from before my kind ever reached space, the few that haven't been destroyed." Shepard stroked her head ridges gently, something he'd found she liked.

"Look if it isn't the two lovebirds…" Ashley said, startling the pair on the public bench they were on (self-maintaining and self-cleaning by the way) and making them look at her with mutinous expressions while she grinned playfully.

Liara was annoyed, frowning she said the first thing that came to mind "Ashley, where have you and Kaidan disappeared to the last few nights?"

Ashley's mouth opened to reply before she realized it may be better to keep it shut "Um…"

"Did you at least use protection?" John Shepard asked his childhood friend tiredly.

Ashley finally blinked and shrugged "We didn't get quite that far, we just went on a TV-watching spree together, and we also went to a few bars and chatted about everything and anything."

"That's good, it's a sign of a healthy relationship, and so is the not-so-fast pace." Shepard said, still running his fingers over Liara's scalp.

Ash glared at Shepard "True, it's like the relationship between you and our resident Prothean Expert, nice, stable and not too recklessly fast. I'm NOT being sarcastic, by I gotta ask, Liara" She turned toward the blue woman, resting her head on her elbows and unintentionally sticking her ass in the air for Kaidan's viewing pleasure. She'd just opened her mouth before Shepard, frowning, called out to his friend.

"Yo! Just because you're my friend doesn't mean you can drool over my sort-of-sister's ass like that!" Ashley blushed and simply sat down next to Liara after that statement.

"Anyhow…" she said slowly "Has little Johnny been doing any embracing of eternity lately?" She said with a broad grin.

"No, we haven't melded since after Feros."

"I'm not talking about melding, Liara." Liara suddenly thought back to the conversation she'd had with Shepard in their shared hotel room earlier.

"Oh… right."

* * *

BEGIN FLASHBACK

_Procyon, July 15, 3868, 7:00 PM Local Time_

"You have been very understanding with me, Shepard, very patient, I appreciate that." Liara said, sitting on the edge of the bed, next to John Shepard, tracing shapes on the back of his hand, running her fingers over skin that was so different from Asari skin. She looked up at him again "I know that there are some strange beliefs about my people. I am familiar with the legend of Asari promiscuity, but those rumours have little basis in fact." She paused for a moment "When on of my people joins with an individual from another species, it is a very deep and spiritual exchange."

_Sounds like all types of melding are similar;_ Shepard thought _sounds like descriptions I've heard of Cybrans interfacing or Aeon mind-melds…_ Then he turned his attention back to her "We do not enter lightly into a Union." _So that's the Asari term for it… interesting…_

He had to find out if it was like the descriptions he'd heard about Cybran, UEF or Aeon connections of various types and names "You make it sound almost mystical…"

"A true Union goes far beyond an ordinary melding; it is a connection that transcends the physical universe. Two become one, thoughts and senses merge, identities intertwine. Memories and emotions weave themselves together, becoming entangled in a single rapturous whole." _Yep, that sounds about right…_ "It is unlike any other experience, in some cases, it can be… a truly life-changing event." _Oh yes, indeed, yes indeed… though I haven't tried anything with anyone yet, that's what I've heard… Wait, that sounds like the voice of experience, maybe I should ask, if she has more experience, it would be nice to get a first-hand account… compare it to tales I've heard from my older Cybran and Aeon buddies… _Shepard thought as he listened.

"Sounds amazing… are you saying…"

Liara's eyes widened, she'd stuck her foot in her mouth again, hadn't she? "No! Oh no! Uh, I am not very good at this am I…" _Open mouth, insert foot, Liara_, her traitorous mind shook its figurative head at her "I am sorry, Shepard, I am trying to explain why I have been so… reserved." _Yeah, you guys talk so much you haven't done anything more intimate than kissing, what's wrong with you?_ Her brain said, _Oh quiet you…_ "The Union is more than just sex, it is the life-blood of my species, the way we Asari evolve and grow as a society. That is why I have never, uh, I mean…" _Great, Liara, you're stuttering again, why does this always happen near John?_ "That is why we must choose our partners with great care."

Shepard smiled at her tenderly; it seemed they were far more similar than some would think, including the inexperience "I want you to be absolutely sure about this, Liara."

"I am only one hundred and six, barely an adult by Asari standards, and I have spent most of my time absorbed in my research. I never really thought about it… not until I met you." _Rambling again, Liara… _Her brain said in disapproval "You are very special to me, Shepard, but with all that's happened, Saren, the Geth, the Reapers, I do not know if we are ready for this."

Shepard agreed with her "These are dark times, Liara, maybe once all this is over…"

Liara let out a mental sigh of relief "I'm glad you understand, Shepard. There is too much at stake, we need to put aside our personal feelings and focus on stopping Saren. I wish it did not have to be that way, but we all have to make sacrifices… Let's… Let's talk about something else…"

"How about watching the sunset, Liara?" They looked out over the darkening skyline, the star Procyon orbited slowly sinking below the horizon as the red glow of Procyon's sky began to fade to an inky blackness. Airbuses flew by regularly; along with patrolling flights of Restorers and Gemini Aerospace-Superiority Fighters, always ready to defend one of the major core worlds of the Coalition of Species. Liara shivered (Shepard put his other arm around her at this), watching the predatory forward-swept wings of the Geminis and the sleek but deadly lines of the Restorers soar by, she was once again reminded that though the Coalition was at peace, they were always on guard, unlike for example Thessia, her people's homeworld.

Other than a few orbital defence stations, the Asari planets tended to not have too many armaments in the open on a regular basis, yet she could see the slight shimmers of the shields of every structure in the city, on standby, and the unmoving but still menacing shapes of Myrmidon SAM turrets on every building, along with the occasional bank of Electron Flak. It was incredible how a society could be changed from a relatively peaceful one to constantly ready for invasion by a war. She knew that if all else failed against the Reapers, it would be up to the Coalition to fight them back, for some reason, she had a feeling they could pull it off if it came down to it. Her last image before she fell asleep in Shepard's arms was that of countless crimson and emerald eyes standing guard over her, keeping her from harm.

Shepard smiled down at her, then picked her up and tucked her into her own bed. He watched her for a few moments before going over to his own bed, the one closer to the window, and lying down, watching the next patrol of two Restorers and a Gemini go by in silence before falling asleep himself. They were both tired from their missions, and were still adjusting to the new schedule, in other words, suffering from Jet Lag.

END FLASHBACK

* * *

"You are referring to the colloquial term for sex with Asari, aren't you, Ashley?" Liara asked, tilting a brow. For some reason, despite not having any hair, all Asari had a darkened line of skin over their eyes that were functionally equivalent to human and Quarian eyebrows or Turian brow ridges, for signalling and body language purposes. "We haven't done anything yet."

"After this long, this many trials and THAT much time spent talking to one another? John, I thought Cybrans weren't into dragging things out too long?" Well, none of the Coalition factions/races were, but that was a point for another day.

"None of the Coalition factions and races like instant gratification either, Ash, makes things dull." Shepard frowned.

"Shepard, I can count on my hands the number of hours in a day you DON'T spend with Liara, and you've been doing this for what? One and a half months? One would think you guys would have gone somewhere by now!" She waved her arms about while Kaidan took a step back to not get slapped by accident; Human women were a lot stronger, usually, than they looked.

"Does this have to do with the legend of Asari promiscuity?" Liara arched a brow at Ashley.

"Well, no, it's just that the average human woman, if her man spent over half of each day with her doing things, talking or just sitting in comfortable silence while doing their work, it would generally only take about a month for the relationship to develop a sexual aspect!"

"You make a good point, Williams, but we just don't feel ready yet, can you drop it?" Ash knew she'd gone a bit far as soon as Shepard used her last name. Then again, Shepard was last she heard still a virgin, so it was normal for him to be cautious in his first real relationship… _Ding!_ Her brain slapped itself as she realized what the

"Oh, sorry, Shepard, I just realized something…" Ashley said "let's forget we had this conversation, can we?"

"Sure, Ash, Liara, I think we should get moving, there's some things Garrus and Wrex would like to deal with before we get our next lead on Saren…"

* * *

_MSV Fedele, July 18, 3868_

After battling their way through the Test Subjects in the hold of the ship, a thoroughly disgusted Shepard led Garrus and Liara through the ship in search of Saleon. Garrus chose to comment at this point after they'd searched the engine block "If we'd brought Tali along her Omni could have detected him in about a second…"

"Yeah, and you want to see a teenaged Quarian use projectile vomiting as an attack?" Shepard growled. Liara had nearly thrown up after they'd killed all the test subjects, and Shepard suspected Tali was a lot less hardened than the Asari, who was used to defending herself from merc or pirate bands on remote digs.

"We have him!" Garrus exclaimed once they'd gotten closer to the cockpit of the freighter. "He's in the room on the right!" He started to move forward but Shepard stopped him with a hand.

"Garrus, let me go first. We don't know what he's got planned…" Shepard cloaked and set the comms on his suit to only transmit to Tali and Liara, not to the outside world. Then the Cybran breached the door, blasting it off its hinges and moving behind the creepy-looking Salarian that greeted them.

"Thank you, I thought no one would come to rescue me…" The Salarian was visibly relieved.

"That's him, Shepard, that's Saleon." Garrus raised his Gauss SMG toward the Salarian's head.

"What? Who's Dr. Saleon? I'm Dr. Heart!" The Salarian said, waving his arms about.

"Garrus, stand down." Shepard made himself audible through Garrus's suit speakers "No one knows what the hell this bastard's been doing, we should take him back to the Coalition military, and they'll interrogate them, then turn him over the Council, we need to see if he has any more alb locations and where/who the flying fuck his customers are."

Garrus objected for a bit of back-and-forth before he shook his head and looked pointedly at Saleon "You are one lucky bastard of a Salarian."

"Thank you." Saleon went for his gun, but before Liara or Garrus could react to shoot him dead Shepard had already meleed him over the head, knocking him out The Cybran de-cloaked and flared his optics brightly in threat.

"Now boys, it's time to give this doctor a taste of his own medicine…" Shepard said, cracking his knuckles "Liara, go back to the ship and tell Wrex to get his Krogan ass down here, be careful."

"Understood, Shepard" Liara nodded, her boyfriend, as Ashley had termed it, was generally a nice man, but he was the sort who believed in giving punishment where it was deserved. He didn't want her to see it, which was only natural since she didn't like unnecessary violence, but in this case, seeing those test subjects… "Make sure there's something of him left for me to Warp when I get back with Wrex."

* * *

"And that, Garrus, is how you dole out justice." Shepard announced proudly, they had dropped Saleon's stasis pod off at Rakhana to keep him away from too much nanolathing technology as well as ensure he would be interrogated by the Coalition's people, and his crimes unravelled. By the time they'd stuffed the Salarian into the stasis pod, they'd spent well over two hours abusing the scumbag, small potatoes compared to the pain he'd inflicted on others, but in this case simply a case of righteous retribution…

"Thank you, Shepard, by the way, Wrex, you said something earlier about something you wanted to do too?"

"Well, there's a suit of ceremonial family armour that I'd like to get back, it's been missing for over a thousand years now… and it's finally turned up in the hands of a Profiteer named Tonn Actus. He's supposed to be on Tuntau, in the Phoenix System of the Argos Rho cluster."

* * *

_Tuntau, July 18, 3868_

"I really love the LBR…" Garrus said, theatrically bugging his gun.

"Well so do I, Garrus, but I just want to ask, when's the wedding?" Shepard asked, walking past the Turian. "The Overcharge bolts are a lot nicer than the Assassination ability the other side has, aren't they?"

"Yep, and it also functions as an assault rifle." Garrus said, grinning, as they walked into the structure. "That's why I love it."

"This is the place, Shepard, see all these trophies? Tonn Actus is a collector… more like a grave robber…" Wrex growled, looking forward, holding his shotgun, as the Gauss Chaingun was inconvenient at best in cramped spaces. "The armour's somewhere here… I know it. And I know the layout of this sort of pirate hideout, an entrance room and a main room where most of the stuff is, possibly with a dormitory, let's go, shall we, Shepard?"

"Yes, let's, Omni's picked up a number of hostiles, standard procedure, Wrex, Liara?"

"Standard procedure, Shepard." Wrex rumbled in agreement.

This consisted of Liara throwing a Singularity, then Lifting everyone not caught in it, Wrex using Lift and Throw along with liberal amounts of ammunition, Garrus countering snipers, and Shepard covering for Tali, who was apparently ill in med bay. It wasn't like his armour's electronic suites were that bad; they just weren't as good as Tali's configuration.

The two Pirate Snipers in the main room were the first to die, three of the Pirate Troopers having been caught in the Singularity while the other five were being thrown around. Tonn Actus had been put in stasis for now by Liara while the team wreaked havoc. Shepard deployed an area Sabotage on the Turian pirates before advancing with Wrex toward them, using his GLMG for point-blank kills. Once the last target went down, the squad waited around for the Stasis field around Tonn Actus to fall (Liara actually had to counteract it after they finished looting the pirate outpost) and Wrex began questioning the Turian.

Liara frowned to herself. Her biotics had flared unusually high ever since she'd first melded, that was with Shepard, it was strange, her stasis field should at most have lasted around 21 seconds with her age level and training level… instead, it had endured for over three minutes. By the 30-second mark after killing all the pirates i.e. 60 seconds after she'd cast it, the crew had gotten so bored that Wrex had drawn up a chair, sat down and begun polishing his shotgun, while Garrus, Shepard and herself had gone around searching for goodies. After they'd concluded that there was nothing useful in the base anymore, they came back and sat around for about half a minute before Shepard had asked if she was able to cancel the biotic fields. She cancelled it, and now she was wondering why the hell her Singularity had hung around until about two minutes after it was cast. Normally, a Maiden-stage Asari could manage AT MOST around 20 seconds, yet she didn't even feel tired. Indeed, she hadn't noticed the power drain a Singularity held for that long would cause until she'd looked around and seen it, then she simply cancelled it. It was disconcerting… And also, it wasn't entirely to do with the Element Zero Cores her suit was upgraded with, since she'd shut them off to check her actual power after freaking herself out while practicing.

"Goodbye, Tonn Actus." Wrex's booming voice cut through her reverie as he pressed his Sonic Pulse Shotgun to the Turian's face and fired. His entire body sort of liquefied and exploded from the amount of resonant energy bouncing around in it, showering the squad's over-shields with bits of blue blood and Turian meat. "Ya know, Shepard, looking at this, I can't believe my ancestors ever wore this piece of garbage…" He growled, looking at the pale grey armour with a Krogan frown, shaking his head.

"Well, Wrex, we've got your armour, let's get back to the ship."

* * *

"Liara, is something wrong?" Shepard asked, sitting down next to her in the mess hall with his food, she had been picking at her food with a frown if intense concentration on her face for the last little while, and he was a bit worried, having been going around checking on the various crewmembers and seeing her sitting there brooding. He would have come over earlier, but it had seemed like she felt like thinking on her own, but after watching her for a while, he decided to close the distance.

"Yes." That was even more worrying for John, Liara was most certainly NOT the monosyllabic type… she was the type of girl who you could spend forever talking to and not get bored… maybe that was just because it was from his perspective. They would often spend hours talking about things or just enjoying each others' presence, so why did she seem so tense now?

"Is it something you can tell me about?"

"Well, Shepard… I guess I can tell you. Come with me please." She picked her food container (reinforced, shatter-proof glass) and proceeded to her room, putting it on her desk for later, closing the lid. "There's something I need to show you in the Range…"

John followed her wordlessly, a comforting presence to be sure, but recently, when she looked at him, ever since their last conversation about their relationship, she felt odd, it was like a sort of need… no, hunger would be a better term, for him. It was almost frightening to Liara, she'd never felt anything quite like it before. It took a while, but the elevator eventually reached the Range.

"Shepard, I've detected something odd about my biotics…" She began, starting to remove her armour piece by piece.

Shepard grinned at her "Gee, Liara, if you wanted to do something with me, you could have just said so, our rooms offer a lot more privacy than this."

"Very funny, John" Liara glared at him for a moment before continuing "My biotics have slowly become abnormally powerful ever since we melded. I really noticed it today…"

"Did this have anything to do with the abnormally long Stasis field?" Indeed, said long stasis field had been quite boring…

"Yes, along with several other facts. That Stasis field could at most last about 20 seconds for someone of my age and training level, yet it held on for over 3 minutes until I cancelled it. Also, the Singularities I've been casting, have you noticed that they got progressively bigger and more powerful the longer I was on the Normandy?"

"Yes, so what's your point? The Normandy and the mission provide good practice in biotics, that's all I see in this matter…" Shepard asked, tilting his head.

"Shepard, remember the Stasis field my mother cast on us? True, we were five people, but the fields only lasted around 30 seconds, though it wasn't at full power. Also, even with a full powered biotic blast, my Barrier held her back for a good few seconds. That blast had a tremendous amount of energy. I am only a Maiden, a hundred and six, my mother is over 1500 years of age and one of the if not THE most powerful Matriarch among the Asari. The average Matron would not have been able to hold her at maximum power for half of what I did. So unless I have somehow gained late Matron Stage power levels enhanced by my armour, something else is happening to me, something I can't really explain."

"Liara, whatever happens, I'll be here to help you, don't forget that." Shepard said, watching the woman he'd fallen in love with hesitate for a moment before walking over to the Range Settings Console.

Liara commanded the computer to put up twenty distinct objects, each 100 kg in mass, on the deck, then once the targets were nanolathed she threw out a single Singularity. All twenty began flying around the singularity. "Shepard, a normal singularity could AT MOST hold a total of ten discrete masses, within a radius of about ten meters, and last for about thirty seconds, that's talking about middle to late Matron Stage power levels. Watch this."

Three minutes later they were still sitting there and Liara herself was beginning to grow bored, before the Singularity died down and the blocks dropped back to the floor and she told the console to clear the Range. Shepard turned to Liara "Liara, there haven't been any other effects, have there?" She shook her head "Then we're fine, Liara, just remember to cancel your Singularities when needed, and sometimes your Stasis fields too."

"Okay, Shepard." It was nice hearing comforting words, but deep down, Liara knew that something was not right, there was an inherent wrongness about this, about her, but since it wasn't affecting anything yet, she would put it aside. After this whole mess was over, after this Reaper thing was dealt with, they could take their time finding out about what the hell this condition affecting her was.

* * *

A/N: Since this was requested, I will go over the Coalition's space fleets. Please note that for technical details go to "The Road to War" or "A Sovereign Awakes" (for the Battle Cruiser).

Liara's extra-powerful biotics will come in very useful later, and is an important plot device. Too bad it only gave her slight mood swings this time around though… Things will get worse later for Liara, I promise you that, when it comes time for SupCom: ME 2 i.e. another cakewalk, do not forget these little things.

* * *

COALITION CODEX ENTRY: COALITION SPACE COMMAND

The Coalition Space Command, CSC for short, was established when the various factions of the Coalition agreed on the need for a space navy after the Seraphim War. So, designs were put forward, contested, and then assembled and tested in live-fire exercises, in the end, we come to the CSC of today, one of the if not the most powerful space navies of the known Galaxy.

CSC Ships are deployed in the field in conjunction with Aerospace units, adapted from the Ari Units of the Seraphim War. The most commonly seen type of craft that does not qualify as a starship is the Restorer T3 AA Gunship, other frequently seen types are the Gemini Aerospace Superiority Fighter, Spook Spy Plane, Revenant Strategic Bomber, and Shocker Strategic Bomber. On occasion, Janus Fighter-Bombers or Broadsword T3 Heavy Gunships are also deployed. These ships are transported to the battlefield either attached to the transportation clamps of friendly starships or in the holds of friendly carriers. They can be built in carriers in the field or all levels of orbital defence stations, and are absolutely lethal in numbers against capital ships or, one on one against any known space fighter deployed by any other faction.

The Coalition's starships are separated into categories based on the classes defined by the CSC, all are multi-purpose craft designed to handle most threats on their own. These ships are organized into Frigate Groups, Hunter Clutches and Hunter Squadrons for ease of deployment. Size-wise they (the actual starships, not the aerospace units built at an Air Factory or in a carrier) are in this order (small to LARGE): Corvette, Frigate, Destroyer, Light Cruiser, Heavy Cruiser, Escort Carrier, Battle Cruiser. More will be added in time, namely Battleships and Fleet Carriers.

Back to organization: each Frigate Group is 6 Frigates and 10 Corvettes; they are the usual unit for garrison work of remote systems (each group can cover up to 2 systems). A Hunter Clutch is 1 Heavy Cruiser (Artillery, AA, Tactical Missiles and Missile Defence), 2 Light Cruisers (Tactical Missiles, AA, TMD), 3 Destroyers (Direct Fire, relatively speaking), and an attached Frigate Group (6 Frigates, 10 Corvettes). Hunter Clutches are generally the rapid reaction forces deployed inside Coalition Space, and a full Hunter Clutch (22 ships) is a force to be reckoned with.

Hunter Squadrons consist of a Battle Cruiser and Escort Carrier, plus four Hunter Clutches, for a total of 2+4x22=90 ships. They are deployed around core worlds and as emergency response for serious threats. The very presence of a full Hunter Squadron has been known to make enemy fleets retreat in fear. Other, levels of organization will likely be introduced with the introduction of new ship classes. For example, rumours abound of the planning of Battleships and Fleet Carriers.

The Coalition Space Command does not only handle fleets of starships and their auxiliaries, it also deals in orbital defences and space construction projects. Construction projects generally follow this procedure: A Ship Gantry, complete with a Paragon Resource Generator, is built off the mass of an asteroid. Then the glorified starship (that can build other starships) moves under its own power to construct orbital defence stations, which are essentially slow starships with much more weaponry than needed, thus making them slow. The Ship Gantry, once it completes deploying all the orbital defences one system needs (and all the Starships too), folds itself up (or rather compacts itself) and uses some form of FTL travel (be it Quantum Jump, Mass Effect or Warp Jump courtesy of the agreement the Coalition has with Raynor's Raiders) to head for the next system if necessary. Currently, most Ship Gantries in the Coalition are concentrated in the systems of the Core Worlds of the various factions.

Space Elevators follow a very different procedure: The foundation is built just like any normal structure, Engineers then build most of the next section before activating magnetic treads/wheels (hence why it's usually Cybran/UEF Engineers for the task) and clinging to the side of the already-built section and finishing off the exterior of the next section. Then they climb onto the top of say Section 2 and build the core of Section 3 before retreating to the vertical side walls of Section 2 and nanolathing the outside sections of Section 3. This procedure is repeated many times, each time the structure climbing a few hundred meters, before the structure is complete. It can be quite comical to watch the engineers rolling up the sides of a space elevator like snails up a stick (adding more as they go).

Orbital Defences are generally of five categories: Light Orbital Defence Satellite, Light Orbital Defence Station, Medium Orbital Defence Station, Heavy Orbital Defence Station, and Orbital Strategic Missile Station. Light Orbital Defence Satellites are also known as Novax Defence Satellites, with one plasma accelerator (8000 damage over 4 seconds with a 16-sec recharge, so 400 DPS vs. shields/ground 800 DPS vs. Air/Space). All Orbital defences except Novax Defence Satellites are permanently stealthed (or can be), and Cloaking systems are being developed for the Medium, Heavy and Strategic Missile Stations. All orbital defence stations are also able to navigate under their own power, albeit slowly, though the Satellite is considered quite speedy and manoeuvrable.

Light Orbital Defence Stations are glorified CZARs, with the Quantum Beam Generator, Temporal Fizz Launchers, Zealot Space Interception Missiles, and banks of Electron Flak. These function not only as orbital defences but also as refuel and repair facilities for smaller vessels (considering a CZAR is a flying saucer 400 meters in diameter, it can repair anything up to a Coalition Frigate with ridiculous ease, though starships generally rely on repair drones anyways)

Medium Orbital Defence Stations feature two prongs, each with one Heavy Microwave Laser and its coaxial Heavy Oblivion Cannon. The center of the connecting bar of the (usually parallel) prongs features the quantum propulsion drive, a small resource generator, and a Guardian Strategic Missile Defence silo (SMD, the reason for the resource generator). The stations also have other auxiliary weapons, namely Flak, Ravagers, Zealots and Zapper TMDs. They are painted black to blend into space while the cloaking system is being developed.

Heavy Orbital Defence Stations are generally deployed over core worlds, featuring Four Heavy Microwave Lasers, four Guardian SMD Silos, and four Sonance Artillery guns in addition to smaller weapons. They are also painted black to blend in.

Orbital Strategic Missile Stations contain a Paragon Quantum Resource Generator, the only roughly triangular structure the Aeon have, and three Yolona Oss Silos. They are equipped with a vast array of other weapons, enough to match up to entire fleets with ridiculous ease. The paint scheme is black and yellow, seemingly random from the sides, but viewed head-on with silo doors shut, it makes a clear nuclear symbol. They are only ever spotted over the capital worlds or more important core worlds. Only one has been deployed outside Coalition Space.

That one Orbital SMS can be found in geosynchronous orbit over Palaven's capital city (at least geosynchronous as in longitude), always with its nuclear symbol displayed for anyone with a decent telescope to see from the Capital city. This has resulted in decongestion of space over that section of Palaven's longitude and a sudden increase in popularity of starports that connect to the capital via train. The net result was the creation of many additional jobs on Palaven, since the treaty stipulated that the Station would be deployed _wherever the seat of government for the Turian Hierarchy was_. In other words, moving the capital of the Turian Hierarchy would have been totally pointless, since the station would have followed, even if it required a Ship Gantry to come in and tow it. Unless it used the Mass Relay Network or Quantum Gate Network, an orbital defence station is incapable of FTL without significant add-ons that take a while to construct and are too much of a hassle for "static" defences anyways. The cities near the capital have suddenly found a need to expand their starports and service industries. This created many additional jobs for their populations (gain of jobs outweighs loss in capital city). Much to the consternation of the Hierarchs, the capital city has become a popular tourist attraction for the view it offers of the station. Many Asari, Turians, Salarians and other races have come to get a first-hand view of the station and its phases, much like the phases of a natural satellite such as Earth's moon.

END CODEX ENTRY

FOR MORE INFORMATION, GO TO MILITARY CODEX, OR, IN THIS CODEX, "AEROSPACE UNITS", "COALITION ORBITAL DEFENCES", "TURIAN WAR" OR "YOLONA OSS EXPERIMENTAL STRATEGIC MISSILE LAUNCHER".

* * *

A/N: IN SUMMARY: When I say a Hunter Squadron, that's a good-sized fleet, a Hunter Clutch is like a Task Force. Hope that satisfies any questions on how the Coalition fleet works for now, eventually, there WILL BE more ship classes, but that's for another day. Also, I un-nerfed the Novax, it's actually sort of worth buying now, especially with the fact that even if the satellite is shot down it'll still do air crash damage, a lot of it, also, the satellite itself costs 800 mass and 8000 Energy and takes about 10 seconds for the Center to assemble a new one (though one Center can only deploy 2 at a time).

**THERE ARE 2 ISSUES TO VOTE ON HERE, READ BOTH BEFORE VOTING IN POLL! (ON MY PROFILE)**

When it comes time for the final stretch of Virmire, what should I name it? (Hint, there's ACU Warfare vs. Reaper-enhanced Krogan with Reaper small-arms)

"Watch and Learn", "This Is How You Do Things", or "You Do It Like This" (I personally favour number 1…)

THE OTHER PROBLEM: Should I include a sort-of sex scene? It will contain a very important plot device, or two, or three (which will become extremely relevant later, in SupCom: ME 2), and not focus so much on the sex as on mental states/thoughts. Vote yes/no in the poll.


	26. The Signal in the Static

A/N: Remember, you can still vote on the chapter name for Part 2 of Virmire! Poll on Profile! (Right now though it looks like Watch and Learn is gonna win.)

For the record I will not add Watch and Weep as an option because Salarians as amphibians do not have tear ducts for that express purpose of expressing sadness.

If anyone thinks Warhammer 40K can match up to SupCom, please remember that SupCom is about 36000 years before then, assembles units much faster, has structural fields, and does a hell of a lot of damage per shot. An Imperator Titan can be toppled by one or a few 90-kilotons Overcharge shots from an ACU/SCU or CZAR it to death. Star Wars will not work both as Black Sun is an ultra-Death Star, and the fact that it's a lot smaller and easier to build.

Final Note: If Warhammer 40K ever goes up against SupCom, they can just blow the core worlds of the Imperium along with the Forge Worlds to dust a couple hundred at a time (when pushed, the Coalition will use large numbers of Paragons to build large numbers of refined Black Sun installations). Also, ACUs can use hit and run tactics easily and basically annihilate the Imperium if it came down to it.

* * *

Chapter 26: The Signal in the Static

_Normandy Bridge, July 20, 3868_

"The Hoc system?" Joker raised an eyebrow "Is it just me or does this next mission from the Council have…"

Shepard cut him off "I know, Joker, it gives me an ad hoc feeling too. And typical name for the cluster too, Sentry Omega, what were they thinking? It's like one of those science fiction things from all the way back in the twenty-first century… Guess the Council doesn't have much in the way of common sense, or rather, whoever came up with the name Sentry Omega and Hoc system doesn't have much sense, they must have gotten mired down in the name of the planet too."

* * *

_In another string universe… (Different from the one mentioned in Chapter 20: Bringing Down the Sky)_

One of Bioware's game designers suddenly perked up "Hey boss, I have a name for the final plot world for Mass Effect!"

"What is it this time?" The supervisor asked tiredly, they'd gotten everything else prepared, they just needed a good name and location for the final plot world before Ilos…

"Virmire, in the Hoc system of the Sentry Omega cluster, after all it is the last mission and you're the last line of real defence the galaxy has against the Reapers, right?" The junior software programmer was very excited.

The supervisor's eyebrows went up "Hmm, that does have a good ring to it; we're a bit mired down in naming the thing so re resorted to an ad hoc name… I like it, boys, let's start recording the voicing and stuff for the Virmire mission!" Behind him, the junior programmer sneezed abruptly "Hmm, I think Shepard or Joker must have complained about your choice of names, eh man?" The supervisor teased.

He had no idea whatsoever how very right he was.

* * *

_Back to Shepard's universe… (Oh wait no that would bear a great resemblance to a certain Asari Scientist) er… back to the string universe that was previously discussed before that detour…_

"A nice, static-laced signal from a hidden spec ops team, what a stereotypical plot device" Kaidan commented "Whatever greater power's out there has better be laughing, because we sure aren't."

"Well, Kaidan, that is true… Anyways, see those defence towers around Saren's base?"

"They're big, almost as big as a shield generator…"

"Yeah, I'm not about to take the risk of taking the Normandy into that sort of firepower, which is why it's up to you to get a base up and help us out, we'll need a base to do this, I'm going to go ahead with the team on the Rhino, Kaidan, stay here with Joker and baby-sit him, Ash, you're in the SCU this time, don't make me regret it."

"You got it, Commander." Ashley nodded before leaving for the cargo bay, where she would board the SCU through a nanolathed catwalk leading between the airlocks.

"Joker, we're going in for a drop, can you get us in under Radar?"

"Shepard, did you forget this tub is permanently stealthed?"

"Oh, right."

* * *

_Virmire, July 20, 3868_

"Successful drop, wouldn't you say, sir?" Joker asked.

Shepard shook his head sadly at Joker's childish tone "Yes, Joker, just hold position until we get enough AA Towers off-line to let you get closer." He put in the destination coordinates for the Rhino and the tank "lurched" (it was more like a soft hum from the floor) into motion. After rounding the second corner, the threat board lit up with objects that were so small as to be originally classed as wildlife and therefore non-threatening. The Rhino ploughed its way through a small swarm of Geth Rocket Drones and Geth Assault Drones before the guns could traverse enough to actually hit one, other than the ones that were rammed into the side/top of the barrels by the sheer speed of the tank. After tearing through them Shepard stated calmly "Oops… everyone out, let's take care of the things."

During the firefight, Liara asked Shepard "Shepard, why couldn't we deal with these things from inside the Rhino?"

"The Rhino's guns are too annoyingly accurate, so they, like most Coalition weapons other than AA guns, aren't good for dealing with small, manoeuvrable targets, speed isn't an issue, it's just that these things change direction too fast for it to be very efficient, plus they can get close and we'll need to run them over/ram them if that happens." Shepard explained while putting down another pair of Assault drones with his LBR.

"Well, that makes sense, though I sense there's more to it?" Wrex had pulled in to the other side of the rock Shepard was behind (Liara was behind another rock some distance away).

"Well, we have a Krogan with us, it would be just cruel to not let him have fun, right, Wrex?"

Wrex's helmet displayed a grin "Yes, indeed."

"Shepard, picking up more drones around the next corner." Tali reported once the fighting had died down.

"Well, let's swat more of the annoying pests." Shepard said, shrugging "It really feels like we're overpowered compared to our enemies, I mean, in all the shooter-type games I've played, this would be summed up in one word."

"What would that word be?" Tali asked.

"Hacks."

"Oh… by the way, what will the Rhino do?"

"Follow us, and not fire unless it's at vehicles." Shepard stated casually, still walking along the path. "That's what happens when friendly infantry are in the field; it'll follow at a safe distance and at our pace."

"I'm picking up more signatures, Rocket Troopers and Juggernauts."

"We can take them, any other Drones?"

"A few Rocket Drones, but it shouldn't be a problem."

"Let's stay out here for now, more fun that way." Shepard said, opening fire on the first Geth Rocket Trooper that came into view, putting one overcharged laser bolt through its flashlight head before it could even notice him and the team. Then the team popped into cover, disruptor rockets may not be much against their shields, but in numbers they could still do damage, especially as the team was now pinned down by the two Geth Juggernauts that charged them with a company of Shock Troopers and Troopers. Shepard flipped the switch on the Rhino just before the Geth dove behind cover, then laughed.

"What are you laughing at… oh, okay then." Garrus muttered, watching the Particle Cannons pulverize the rocks and blast apart the Geth that had hidden behind them. Despite the carnage the Rhino wrought, the team still had to deal with the Drones more or less on their own, as they simply weren't registering as individual threats to the Rhino, such was their inadequacy, and the Rhino's accurate fire kept missing as it fired "through" the diffuse blob of a target it detected.

The squad hopped aboard the Tank once Tali reported detecting a structure in the distance beyond some more corners, it would be a boring ride, but thanks to the tank's speed a short one. Shepard decided to manual-aim to relieve boredom for the squad, as they (aka Wrex and Garrus) were now debating how many times Shepard would miss while firing into the small crowd of Geth outside the gatehouse. Tali and Liara settled on at most one miss and refused to delve further into the conversation, instead choosing to chat idly about current affairs.

Needless to say, the women are always right (unless you count shooting fuel containers just for the hell of it as missing). Once the Geth were down, Shepard decided the squad needed to have some fun and bailed out to take out whatever Geth were inside the gatehouse (and collect goodies) as opposed to simply blowing the gatehouse into ash with the Rhino's Particle Cannons. Wrex was at the front of the group and got the first kill, by meleeing a Geth Trooper before blasting it with his shotgun, scattering its parts. Tali was next to get a kill, thanks to the concentrated firepower (as opposed to the rate of fire focus typical of other automatic weapons) inherent in shotguns, and the phased plasma nature of Phasic weapons. Then Shepard and Garrus joined in by blowing away some Hoppers and Snipers while Wrex and Tali deal with Shock Trooper after Shock Trooper. Liara was last onto the floor and immediately sighted in on a Geth Prime that had just rounded a corner behind the rest of the Geth; she grabbed it in a Lift, putting in her usual percentage of her biotic energy.

The Prime's head smashed clear through the ceiling of the large balcony they were currently battling on. The machine kept on crushing itself through the ceiling and roof overhang bit by bit as Liara watched, gaping at the amount of power she'd put out, until finally she cancelled the Lift fields after Shepard reminded her that all the Geth were down. The body of the Prime jerked a couple more times with electrical currents before the machine's hands and legs finally went still, its head and most of the torso still stuck through the ceiling in an almost comical way. Shepard was strongly reminded of watching remakes of Tom and Jerry when he was younger.

"You know, Liara, I don't think we're even going to need the Rhino to deal with any Armatures we come across…" Shepard said "Guys, start looting, Liara, if you see a Colossus, test your new Warp on it, will ya?"

"Not a problem, Shepard." Liara answered, grinning but secretly extremely worried at her new power level, when, not if, she decided to finally share herself fully with Shepard, she'd have to be extremely careful if they decided to use biotics to heighten the experience. She didn't want to kill him.

After the group climbed back into the Rhino to make the ride marginally less long, they rumbled up the path and engaged in a rather brief firefight with a Geth Colossus. The reason to the extreme brevity was "Liara, use Lift!"

"You sure Lift will work?" She poked her head out of the turret hatch and did it anyways, but felt the power shifting into a more advanced form even as she deployed it, a form rarely achieved by most Asari before the mid Matriarch stage. "Shepard, I… my Lift… it just evolved…" Much to everyone's astonishment, the Colossus rose up into the air, steadily gaining speed due to the Propel fields being anchored to its mass and providing a constant thrust upward.

Twenty or so seconds later, Liara cancelled the Propel field and the Colossus came crashing back unceremoniously, hard enough to destroy the machine and kick up a dust cloud. When the dust settled, the crew shook themselves off and decided to get back into the Rhino for now. "What was that?" Tali asked, since Wrex was still too busy trying to shut his jaw, which had locked in place from being open so wide for so long.

"The final evolution of the Lift power tree, Propel, it combines Lift, Throw, Slam and other such powers, very powerful, higher Rate of Fire than all the others combined, and unheard of for even Matrons. I don't know how it happened, but my biotics have been growing unusually powerful lately…" Liara shook her helmeted head sadly "It won't affect the mission, I don't know why but my powers have identify friend or foe enabled now…" it had happened when the massive Throw she'd put out back in the Normandy's Range (Joker asked if Shepard had decided to set off a bomb in the Range) had flowed around Shepard harmlessly, and the Lift she'd used on that Prime had flowed around Wrex, who had gotten in the way after the fields left her hand. "The evolution was probably accelerated by my element zero cores upgrade for my arm armour…" She'd upgraded her left arm for biotics and her right for weapons, just to be safe, though most of her other armour upgrades were biotic-oriented.

"That was good work, Liara, though I wonder what will happen if you tried using Warp on an Armature or even a Colossus."

"Well, I'll do it the next time we see a Colossus then. But you're dealing with the Armatures, Shepard, evolving a power takes a lot of energy…" Liara stumbled a bit (over a rock) and Shepard caught her

"Alright, Liara, seems like you're a big game hunter, eh?" Shepard grinned as he helped her into the Rhino.

Once they came to a T-junction, they came under fire from three Armatures, the Rhino had an easy time of it as it killed the two on the right with its cannons and rammed/ran over the one on the left. Then they headed along the path to the right and came face-to-face with another Geth Colossus before the over-shield had fully recharged.

Still, it was enough to protect Liara as she deployed a Warp from the turret hatch. The rhino didn't bother shooting as the multitude of small singularities tore away at the Colossus, focusing on its flashlight head. When it finally ended, the Colossus sparked a couple times, shook, squealed, and stumbled about drunkenly before the Rhino let loose. One volley of three bolts was enough to put the walker down permanently. The Rhino's sensors picked up another Colossus to their left and the turret swung about toward it, trading fire until the Colossus fell almost at the same time as the Rhino's over-shield. The armature that skittered around the Colossus wreck was no match for the tank, which rolled on relatively unperturbed as its over-shields slowly recharged.

* * *

The second and third gatehouses had almost been tedious with liberal use of biotics, especially Singularity, which had swallowed up the Geth rather quickly and allowed for live-fire target practice. Liara got good use out of her new Propel power, unfortunately for the Geth Juggernauts and Primes that were the usual victims, as it almost inevitably ended up with them head-first in walls, ceiling and in one case the floor. According to Tali, "I wasn't aware Geth servos allowed them to do over 220 degrees in splits… wonder when they gained that ability…" This was in reference to the unfortunate Geth Prime that had its head buried somewhere inside the floor of Gatehouse Two.

However, the AA Tower had been highly interesting "I wasn't aware anyone outside the Coalition had plasma accelerators…" Ashley mused over the comms when Shepard received the scan data and identified the turret weapon as a jacked-up plasma accelerator, similar to that of a Novax Defence Satellite but with much higher intensity and shorter cool-down, as well as a higher power drain, of course.

"Send an engineer over to reclaim this sucker later, Ashley; The Coalition will be interested in the designs and tech." Shepard said as he shut the tower down by blowing out the landlines that fed it power and shutting down the internal backup reactor. In actual fact, Liara did the last part, by using Warp on the unfortunate reactor assembly after they shut it down, tearing it to bits and ensuring it would stay down. "Joker, it's safe to bring in the Normandy now…"

"Aye, Captain, I'm heading for the Salarians' camp, will clear the way for ya if I see anything big."

"Sure, see ya in a bit, Joker." The Rhino rumbled into motion as the Normandy flew overhead. The tank drove across a series of shallow, blackened craters in the ground where a third gatehouse had probably been at one point or another (evidenced by the Geth weapons they picked up) before it rounded a final corner and rolled up to a hill near the Salarian base of operations, where several hundred Salarians were busily at work.

"You gotta wonder how the Geth kept them cooped up here with such meagre forces."

"I don't think you quite realize how inept most of the Council Races are compared to the Geth, Shepard, that last gatehouse probably had dozens of Geth as a garrison." Wrex growled, shaking his head. "That's why the Council was too scared to help the Quarians six hundred years ago and why they still haven't stomped on the Geth just to take back the old Quarian colonies for resources, forget helping the Quarians, they only help themselves."

"I don't like those accusations, Wrex…" Liara said, sounding hurt.

"I hate to admit it, Liara, but they're right, why do you think the Geth have so successfully kept everyone outside the Perseus Veil and in fear for the last six hundred years?" Garrus shook his head "We're too slow to change, that's why…"

"Sir, we have a problem, we're grounded until further notice." Joker said over the comm. while the group sat there looking at the base through the Rhino's displays.

* * *

Captain Kirrahe of the Third Infiltration Regiment had seen his superiors' reports and recommendations on him, what good Salarian STG member did not? If they couldn't find that out, they usually weren't going to last long on the STG, it was simply the truth, because the encryptions and firewalls were designed to keep the members' skills sharp. Thus he knew that many others saw him as a sharp, focused, sensible, controlled male, but this human male was really beginning to get on his nerves, did he understand how powerful Saren's Krogan army was? What sort of infantry weapons they were now equipped with? Their numbers? Probably not from the way he spoke, filled with foolish overconfidence… was that rumbling?

The Salarian had just turned his head around in the direction of the rumble and called out an alert to his men when a large, more-or-less flat black and red thing flew over the nearby hill, causing the Salarians to raise their rifles instinctively until the human male—Kaidan Alenko, unless his memory was failing him—motioned for them to calm down just before the ground shook as the black thing hit the ground and sped on toward the Salarian camp, his men scattered while the human male simply crossed his arms and smiled, putting his helmet on with one hand while extending his other arm and gun, pointed toward the ground. The black thing began to brake after it had barrelled through the front "entrance" of the base, going almost impossibly fast until the very last second, when it slowed down enough to touch Kaidan's gun with the front of one tread guard, with a soft click.

Kirrahe, once the dust had settled and he'd stopped squinting and thinking _thank whatever powers that be for my terrestrial adaptations… they're very helpful in this sort of situation,_ blinked as he looked up at the treads that stood before him, almost three males tall, and gulped, shuddering involuntarily. It was a natural response, seeing as how he was in the presence of possibly the most lethal land vehicle he had ever seen in his entire life. The three enormous barrels that stuck out over the treads helped convince him of that.

Kaidan took off his helmet when the dust settled "This, is the Rhino Medium Tank, we would have brought something bigger and better, but…" he trailed off.

Kirrahe, along with the other Salarians that had begun to move closer, stared at him "Bigger?" He spluttered.

"Apparently, even after two years, you guys still don't know much about how the Coalition wages war." A new voice reached his hearing diaphragms. "I'm Commander Shepard, and this lot behind me, plus Kaidan here and Ashley, who's currently away, are my ground team." He gestured to the crew, who were dressed in an array of different armours, with green, red, blue and yellow circuitry and optics, in four distinct styles. Two of the individuals, both females, recognizable by the presence of breasts, only in that position on Quarians, Asari, Humans or Batarians… no the head wasn't tall enough to be Batarian… probably Humans by his guess.

"Captain Kirrahe, Third Infiltration Regiment, STG, is your team all the Council sent?" He had composed himself again, but he had a feeling that even if that was true, this Commander Shepard and his team, plus the Landcruiser they brought, might be enough. Then again, they might not be.

"Well, the transmission did come out pretty garbled at best… The Council sent me and the Coalition ship I command here to investigate"

"What? Dammit… I lost half my men investigating this place… and they tell you to do the exact same thing? Unbelievable… un-fucking-believable. "

"So, what did you find that caused you to send out a distress call?" Liara asked curiously.

Kirrahe looked at the female for a moment, then shrugged, whether she was Asari, Human or Quarian wouldn't matter at this point, so he might as well tell them what they needed to know "Saren's base is heavily fortified and guarded by legions of Geth, and if that's not enough he's been breeding an army of Krogan."

"How is that possible?" Wrex asked, his optics flaring slightly.

"Saren seems to have found a cure or at least partial cure for the Genophage, either that or cloning, or maybe some combination thereof, either way, it needs to be destroyed."

"That's not possible, it could save the Krogan as a species!" Wrex retorted hotly. Kirrahe frowned, he would not expect a human to respond as such, though he did wonder what the low placement of the optics meant… there could potentially be room for a Krogan's hump under that tower-like torso/helmet assembly…

"It's a weapon and needs to be destroyed, it was a mistake of us to uplift the Krogan in the first place, way back in the Rachni Wars." He shook his head, by the time he looked up, the yellow-optics/circuitry one was in his face and had set the face piece of its, no, his, armour to transparent, revealing an extremely pissed Krogan that was significantly taller than Kirrahe himself.

"WE are NOT a mistake!" Wrex stated in an extremely loud voice, the effect was amplified by his armour, which produced a rather strong gust of air from the mouthpiece, causing Kirrahe to grit his teeth and squint in the face of the wind. The angry Krogan then set his face armour plating (the clear plate was an emergency measure in case armour environmental awareness systems failed) back in place before huffing one more time in Kirrahe's face and stomping off angrily.

Kirrahe rubbed his eyes to clear out the dust that had gotten in, then shook his head and turned to Shepard, whose red optics were glaring menacingly at the Salarian "Is he going to be a problem? Will we have to deal with him?"

"No, I'll talk to him, I'll get him to see sense." _If you try anything stupid my team and the Rhino are here, and besides Wrex could probably kill your entire camp if push comes to shove, he's a Krogan Battlemaster with Coalition-issue gear, after all._ Shepard thought viciously, being strongly reminded of Order propaganda in the Seraphim War against Cybrans by Kirrahe's words. Of course, he knew the Salarian captain didn't mean for that to happen, but the Council really had to get more of the nuances of the Coalition's past down.

* * *

Wrex was sitting on a rock by the beach, looking down into the water pensively, splashing the water with his armoured feet kicking once so often, watching the fish. It was a position so unlike any Krogan they'd ever heard of that Garrus's mandibles were wide open as he looked through his rifle scope at Wrex before Liara put a firm hand on his scope and told him no spying on Shepard and Wrex's conversation. Despite this, Garrus whipped out a camera and snapped a shot of Wrex for future blackmail material. Believe it or not, Wrex was actually not all that serious and liked joking around, so he'd like this, even if Garrus couldn't have gotten a slightly better image through the scope. Garrus didn't know what Liara was so worried about, he didn't even deploy the LBR into Sniper Mode, and in the past he'd accidentally hit Wrex more than once (blame bathroom mirrors in bar fights) with the laser bolts and the Krogan had been fine with it.

"Hey, Wrex." Shepard said, walking over to the big Krogan.

"Hey, Shepard." Wrex growled, looking up at the human he'd come to respect and be friends with over the last while.

"Wrex, I can promise you this, Ashley's gone for a reason, he and the SCU have a base set up, so we're going to be the one dealing with the facility, not the Salarians, so what do you think I'd do with the data?"

"Oh, I understand now, Shepard, it's just that hearing what that bastard said made me so _angry_…" Wrex cracked his knuckles "I didn't think of that, this battle or rather curb-stomp will be fun to watch…" The Krogan smiled down at the water and shook his head "I hope you can give me the data."

"Wrex, when I get you the data, I want you to remember one thing, be careful with it, those Krogan Saren created are not true Krogan, they are completely controlled by him, so his research is probably based on and surrounded by the taint of indoctrination." Shepard said. "Rest assured I will get you that data but be careful with it, go over it, I don't want to see another race made slaves to the Reapers like the Rachni were so long ago."

"When you put it like that, Shepard, destroy the data, I believe Coalition medical technology is advanced enough to offer us aid?"

"Well, we do have the technology to at lest reduce the impact of the Genophage, though I don't think we can restore the Krogan to the way they were before the Genophage."

"I agree with you on that one, if we aren't careful, we will not be a species, we would become a disease, Shepard, I'll put faith in Coalition tech, more than Reaper-based tech anyhow. No sense creating more thralls for the enemy, right?" Wrex said, grinning at Shepard

"For a Krogan, you are very reasonable."

"That's because I can recognize a better offer when I see one, Shepard, though I do still have a sense of honour, unlike most of the Krogan these days…" Wrex's expression darkened slightly as he got up "Come on, Shepard, let's go kick Saren's ass." HE offered Shepard a hand, which the man took.

"I thought you'd agree to my logic."

"Yeah, I was just playing ya after storming off. And you actually fell for it." Wrex smirked, or the Krogan equivalent, then snapped a picture of Shepard's wide open mouth of pure shock. "Shepard, I think that's the first time I ever saw you gape, you're not supposed to drool, unless it's over your blue girlfriend."

"Huh? Oh, right." Shepard shook his head to clear it before walking back toward the Salarian camp, not hearing or seeing the series of facepalms the rest of the team had pulled after Wrex's words.

* * *

"I have a plan, sort of." Kirrahe said, Shepard glared grumpily at the Salarian, his whole team, minus Ash, was standing around inside the tent with the senior Salarian officers. "It's high risk and involves a lot of luck. I'll divide my men into three teams and hit the front of Saren's base while you and your team, Shadow, sneak around the back to find out as much as you can and expose any weak points we can use to destroy the base."

"We have another plan that will work, but I'd like to hear you talk about yours first, that about the other teams? Their names?"

"Aegohr, Mannovai, and Jaeto, our species' first three colony worlds. I hope it reminds the troops of what we are fighting for. Also, I'd like to ask a favour of you, I need to borrow one of your squad for coordination… if you don't mind…" It would also be nice to have someone who could probably stand up to the enemy weapons at least for a little while instead of dying in two shots or so like his men. It was almost worse than warfare from before kinetic barriers…

"We can talk about that later, first, mobilize your men for the back-up plan. I'll consult Ashley to ask her if the primary plan is ready yet."

"Ashley? Oh yes, your missing squad mate… well, I'll go prepare the men, please consider my request, Commander."

"Understand, but make sure they know your plan is the back-up, otherwise when I inform them of that they won't be very happy…" Shepard told the Salarian before he left.

"Are you really that concerned about them?" Tali asked.

"What sort of Commander or Spectre would I be if I condoned needless deaths? All that needs to be true is for Ashley to be ready, and considering how it's been… fifty minutes since she touched down she should be." Shepard then patched the comm. through the Normandy. "Ashley, are you ready?"

"Yes, I'm ready anytime, though I wonder what sort of speech that Salarian's gonna give, so I'm holding off for now." Ashley said.

"Me too, Ash, me too" Shepard answered. "Let's go see what that Salarian comes up with…"

* * *

A/N: In case you haven't noticed, Krogan are a lot bigger in this fic than in canon, they are about 6.5 feet on average and usually bigger if they stand erect.

Also, Wrex may be a little OC but he's been watching/playing a lot of human sci-fi and is getting less headstrong seeing what happened to the overly headstrong Aeon (fanaticism), though of course his head plates have not softened at all. Krogan do not get osteoporosis, so I guess they're always headstrong…

I cannot wait until the ACU warfare of the next chapter and having the Salarians constantly in shock, and I can't believe I put it off this long to have another ACU warfare scene… commencing curb-stomp… though Shepard's team will still do infiltration while Ashley _toys_ with the front of the base.


	27. Watch and Learn

A/N: Though the original Black Sun took a while to research, prototype, and construct, now that the Coalition knows how to do it, if they are truly pushed hard enough they could build a new one within a month with a Paragon powering/supplying mass to it. I believe I mentioned Seraphim Quantum Stabilization tech, which was what the Quantum Arch was based on but also what they used to seal the Rift (see my Prequel to this and SupCom KS). Note that this does not completely nullify the problem, hence why the Coalition HAS NOT BUILT MORE BLACK SUNS OR OTHER PLANET-KILLER WEAPONS. Though if they are pushed enough, say a war with the Imperium of Man (which isn't happening btw), they will build more of the slightly more safe Black Suns, despite the risks.

For the record I have heard of Bolos, reminds me of a souped-up Fatboy. The Fatboy is a lot more flexible than the Bolo though, it can actually fire over the horizon, it can build units, and it can do Air Staging. The Bolo main weapons are the three dorsal plasma cannons, yes? Well, on a Fatboy that space is taken up by the unit construction bay and Air Staging Facilities. Also, a major benefit of the Fatboy is that it can be built in minutes, Bolos must be deployed. And a Bolo's plasma cannons CANNOT be megaton grade, or any missed shots would blow craters kilometres wide in the terrain, which obviously does not occur (from what I have read), hence it must be lower yield… sci-fi writers use megatons and larger numbers without realizing what they are talking about way too often, look at Halo for instance. Also, from descriptions I've read on FFN, a Bolo is not as ridiculously huge as a Fatboy (which is 160 meters wide and 200 long, 40 meters tall, I do believe).

Infantry Melee weapons are planned and will be constructed in the interim years i.e. before SupCom: ME 2 and long before SupCom: The Reclaimers.

I know Black Sun and Death Stars have different niches, but since they're both planet-shattering weapons I put them in the same general category. Black Sun took down at least a dozen Cybran and Aeon Core worlds in one firing if the UEF ending of original SupCom was anything to go by, though I believe the Cybran ending was what really happened since the Cybran military was crippled by QAI, not Black Sun, and the Order of the Illuminate actually had enough commanders left to be a major threat. Note however Death Star does not do orbital superiority, a few fighters took it down. I know that, say, CZARs, are vulnerable to Air-Superiority-Fighter swarms but the Death Star was ridiculously poorly designed.

Originally, I'd completely messed up on the Ashley and Kaidan thing so I had to go back and correct it, I may have missed a few things, but I hope you can understand the idea.

* * *

Chapter 27: Watch and Learn

_Virmire, July 20, 3868_

The Salarian Captain stood on a podium, addressing the hundreds of men still alive under his command "You all know the mission, and what is at stake. I have come to trust each of you with my life, but I have also heard murmurs of discontent. I share your concerns. We are trained for espionage; we would be legends, but the records are sealed. Glory in battle is not our way. Think of our heroes: the Silent Step, who defeated a nation with a single shot. Or the Ever Alert, who kept armies at bay with hidden facts. These giants do not seem to give us solace here, but they are not all that we are. Before the network, there was the fleet. Before diplomacy, there were soldiers!" A raised fist was followed by the STG members under his command "Our influence stopped the Rachni, but before that we held the line! Our influence stopped the Krogan, but before that, we held the line! Our influence will stop Saren; in the battle today, if it comes down to it, we will hold the line!" The crowd burst into cheers and shouts of assent.

Kirrahe stepped aside and gestured to Shepard, who stepped up "Thank you, Captain Kirrahe. I am Commander Shepard, Spectre, as you may know." The crowd murmured in assent. "The plan Captain Kirrahe has briefed you on is the backup, the main plan will consist of my forces, deployed from my ship, assaulting the front of the base while my team sneaks in the back, as to how my ship could carry enough forces, well, Ashley, get that holo-screen up!" He said into his comm. A large wheeled vehicle fell with a thud onto the beach before the base, in the inter-tidal zone; it then deployed three construction drones that built a gigantic holo-screen from the ground up, held up out of tidal level by pillars, in mere seconds.

Shepard could feel the Salarians' eyes bugging out of their heads, and then they turned to stare at him again once he cleared his throat. "Please watch carefully. My team will be commencing the covert data-gathering phase of the operation soon, but please do not miss out on the frontal assault; I hope you find it… comical. Kaidan, stay here and make sure the Salarians don't do anything stupid, like try to harm themselves to see if they are hallucinating."

* * *

The Continentals each carried 12 Ilshavoh Assault Bots plus one Athanah Heavy Shield Generator. There was no point bringing in T3 units since their firepower was such that if they opened fire on the walls, ESPECIALLY Percivals, they had a good chance of eviscerating the whole facility in a few shots (Ionized Plasma Cannons, the main armament of Percivals, were multi-kiloton directed yield weapons, though the Council Races had yet to witness them at full power), before Ashley could reign them in. Besides, it wasn't like they were there to actually destroy the facility, just distract Saren's troops, and of course annihilate them.

Needless to say, the five Continentals' worth of forces found the base's fortifications and garrison slightly laughable. Geth Colossi would fall within seconds and Armatures even faster, not one Athanah's shields dropped, even when anti-cruiser grade guns were repurposed for ground fire, and were promptly blown apart by massed Aire-au Bolter fire. One major benefit of the Ilshavoh over the Obsidian, which was identical in cost and superior in a stand-up fight, was the fact that Ilshavohs could fire over higher obstacles, and were slightly faster due to modifications since the Seraphim War. That meant the wall surrounding Saren's base was NOT a problem whatsoever. Instead of protecting the Geth while they fired at the intruders, the walls now served to form kill zones (i.e. wall openings) for the innumerable hordes of Geth. If they got close (a rare occurrence), the response was usually to stomp on them.

* * *

Shepard, Wrex, Liara, Tali and Garrus jumped down behind the wall and scanned their area carefully before moving forward toward a sort of watchtower. Garrus and Shepard began sniping the Geth as they emerged to greet the squad, but there were simply too many, so the rest of the squad used their SMGs for the purpose they were built for—carbines, also sniping the Geth, though it took more shots, they shot faster. The Geth tried to return fire, but found that an area Sabotage had already taken their weapons offline; attempts to close distance were met with shotgun, flamethrower, or Throw. The acquisition of Propel meant that Liara's Throw was greatly enhanced, resulting in the whole group of Geth caught in the field being plastered into the wall they had been standing in front of, becoming unwilling ornaments in the wall they were now embedded in.

"I am reminded of Tom and Jerry." Shepard commented wryly, inspecting the dents in the wall the Geth were sunken into.

"What's Tom and Jerry?"

"Tell you later, Liara, let's take that watchtower." Shepard gestured, and the team opened fire on the tower, heedless of the Geth firing from behind their portable shields. The Geth were gunned down one by one before the team moved forward to the tower, on the top, they found a console.

"Ah, so that's why the Geth seemed so keen on protecting this place… it's a coordination center for their communication and triangulation frequencies." Tali said, tapping some buttons on the console.

Shepard nodded "In other words, Radar, Tali, you know what to do."

"Already done, Shepard, no worries" Tali's helmet lights indicated a grin.

After looting another weapons locker ("How much money do we need, Shepard?" Wrex asked in exasperation, he was familiar with looting and like it, but this was a bit obsessive even for his tastes…) the team proceeded north and met up with a very friendly group of Geth Rocket Drones. A good dose of automatic fire (precision fire doesn't cut it against small, manoeuvrable targets) dealt with them in short order.

As they got near the next watchtower Shepard came almost face-to-face with a Geth Destroyer when he rounded a rock. The rest of the team took to cover and returned the suppressive fire the Geth and Krogan on the tower threw down while Shepard wrestled the Geth Destroyer. Liara kept glancing at the rolling tangle of limbs worriedly until she got a sudden idea.

"Forgive me, Shepard." She cast a Stasis on them, and then cancelled it on Shepard, which allowed him to get up away from the Geth, pull his LBR, stick it under the Destroyer's chin, and give the Geth a healthy burst of holes until Liara dropped the field and the Geth fell dead. "That's unusual… it's a very uncommon talent for stasis to allow damage, must have something to do with my boost… sorry, John." She said the last bit only to him, having changed the transmission settings.

"No worries, Liara, it got me the upper hand in that fight, you did it to help." Shepard responded as he copped another Rocket Trooper in its flashlight head with a sniper bolt from his LBR.

"Shepard, I'm getting satellite transmissions from that antenna, blasting it off will disrupt the Geth satellite uplink!" Tali shouted as she and Wrex focused fire on the Krogan, finally nailing him after Liara froze him in place along with the rest of the Geth, which resulted in live target practice for Shepard, herself and Garrus.

"Well, what do you think will do it, Tali?"

"Probably a heavy weapon, hey, Wrex, can we use your Nanodart Launcher?"

"I'll do the honours, if you don't mind." Wrex grunted, pulling the weapon out of its slot in his right shoulder tower, shouldering it, locking on to the antenna and firing all in one smooth motion. The antenna collapsed easily, with only one shot. "That was WEAK… maybe I should have tried sneezing on it instead, probably would work too…"

"Nice one, Wrex." Shepard chuckled. "Come on, let's get into the base and see what exactly Saren's been up to. And I WILL get you that data."

They headed up the ramp and the Geth Destroyer heading the other way suddenly lost its head from two Sniper Mode LBR bolts passing through its head and neck. The machine fell to the ground as Shepard sighed "split the kill?"

"That sounds reasonable." Garrus shrugged.

Once they reached the T-junction ahead they took a left and confronted two Krogan who didn't even get close courtesy of Liara using Warp on them. They were torn to bits before the team's eyes before Liara cancelled the Warp. They looted the platform before heading back the way they came because it was a dead end. After following the path a little, they came across a rock ramp that allowed Tali a perfect Omni Sensor scan of the base and a view of the Ilshavohs bashing down everything that came at them. A technician's kit was oddly lying around, so Shepard decided to take it (the armour would not collect anything dangerous to the team or Normandy) before moving north.

"Shepard, I'm detecting some Geth Drones ahead of your location. Be careful, and try to eliminate them, they could become a nuisance later." Ashley told them.

"Spook?" Shepard responded with one word and a grin.

"Of course, it's stealthed after all." Indeed, Spook Spy Planes were the only stealthed Spy Planes and had Sonar in addition to Radar, vision and Omni.

Shepard looked up as they walked north, and sure enough, there was a symbol for a T3 Spy Plane highlighted on his HUD. He explained it "That's the symbol for a T3 Spy Plane; your HUD displays all relevant friendly units in your area, one of the benefits of Coalition armour."

They rounded a corner and noticed the Rocket Drones, Assault Drones and Repair Drones flitting around. Shepard immediately told the crew to volley Electron Grenades, the ensuing explosions were quite pretty for any pyromaniac, especially considering the inherent EMP/overload nature of electron weaponry.

"You gotta wonder why we didn't use grenades more often…" Garrus shook his head in amazement.

"We didn't really need to before now." Shepard stated, picking up a Geth pulse rifle that had once been part of an Assault Drone, checking it for functionality, and throwing it aside in disgust. The gun was completely ruined and wouldn't fetch a penny on the Citadel markets, not that any non-Coalition faction/race even bothered using coins these days… Believe it or not, the Coalition finds physical currency somewhat more reliable in everyday transactions such as grocery shopping, because it's easier to handle and less worrying if you lose some.

They moved toward the coordinates the Spook Spy Plane had downloaded to their armour, and came to the final bridge into Saren's main base. Geth shield screen-thingies were everywhere along the bridge, as well as on the platform on their side of the bridge, serving as a bridgehead. The crew decided to cautiously move up to the bridge but once they were halfway across the threat boards lit up with Geth and Krogan contacts coming out of the woodwork, cutting through the Geth shields with ease with their new weapons. Shepard's team hurried back to their bridgehead under the onslaught of rounds, which were worryingly powerful—about as powerful as typical LSMG bolts. They hunkered down and did their best to return fire against the overwhelming suppressive fire the enemy laid down.

"Ashley, requesting air strike on enemy bridgehead!" Shepard shouted into his suit communications suite.

"Attack Bombers are en route, hold on there, Shepard." Ashley responded

"What type and how many? We don't want to blow up the bridge."

"Don't worry, John, we'll get you across, Attack Bombers do have space to fit people or cargo if needed, you know. And I'm using Scorchers, coming in from behind the enemy, one of them with two Prowlers." Though UEF Cyclone-class Interceptors had a slight advantage in armour and firepower, especially in terms of initial shot, Prowlers had the definite advantage in manoeuvrability. The four interceptors were overall almost exactly tied, so most Commanders chose their interceptors (primary option, secondary option) based n aesthetics.

"Understood, Ash, we're hunkering down here, don't hit us."

"No worries, Shepard." The Scorcher came howling in fast and low, the bomber's "rudimentary" Over-Shield soaking up what little anti-air firepower could be directed at it in time. Over-shields, along with Personal Shields, were an upgrade option which made units more expensive and cost energy to maintain but still considered a nice add-on by most commanders. The two Prowler-class interceptors hung back to dive down on any hostile aircraft that challenged the Scorcher, none did.

Shepard noted the icons and the distances closing in on his HUD as he did his best to slow the multiple Krogan now crossing the bridge toward the team, holding them back with volleys of gunfire and using Grenades as fast as his armour could fabricate them. It was a worrying situation until his HUD lit up with the yellow dots that indicated the Scorcher had dropped its munitions. "Everybody Down!" He shouted as everyone hugged the ground, and not a moment too soon as the flames from the explosions and ignitions sheeted over their cover, and then died down to the original bomb blast zones. The Scorcher pulled up and away with its two escorts tailing it, flying away until it was called in again.

The team looked over their cover to see the entire bridge engulfed in flames, melting under the tons of Thermite and whit phosphorus that had been dumped onto the structure. The bridgehead on the other end was also ablaze, smoke rising into the sky in a grey pillar. Shepard groaned "Ashley, you forgot to turn off the bomb upgrades, didn't you?"

"Er… oops… anyways, a Stinger is en route now, I hope you find it comfortable" Ashley did her best at an innocent grin. The two upgrades usually applied to Scorcher and Zeus-class bombers' firebombs/ bombs were "White Phosphorus Munitions" and "Thermite Munitions". They added damage over time to the Zeus and greatly enhanced the Scorcher's damage power, as was evident from the melting, collapsing bridge in front of the team, a normal Scorcher strike would have simply set it ablaze.

"Sure, Ash, sure." Shepard rolled his eyes.

* * *

"Ugh, what a bunch of pushovers…" Shepard said, shaking his head, they'd generated an alarm on the other side of the base (on one flank from where the Ilshavohs were patiently whittling down Saren's forces, and away from themselves) and gone through a small horde of indoctrinated Salarians.

"Don't you mean Throw-over?" Wrex asked, Liara had indeed been using Throw a lot, though she'd stopped after her first miss. That particular throw had barely caught the top of one Salarian's head with its power (he'd ducked behind a large crate) and it had blown the top of the indoctrinated Salarian's head off, splattering his brains all across the crates behind him, as well as completely squished his body into paste between the two crates he'd been well, between. Liara had decided it was a bit too gruesome and decided to instead deal with her targets the traditional way… gunfire.

After that minor incident, they'd freed a bunch of Salarians, one of whom had in fact been indoctrinated, though a quick punch form Wrex's armoured fist changed that. The small crowd of Salarians were picked up by a Stinger that had chewed through all the enemies that tried to stop it before flying away with the freed Prisoners of War (Shepard's scanners indicated no abnormal brain activity).

Wrex was beginning to find his old salvaging methods inadequate, watching Shepard go through the base's weapons lockers, crates, shelves, and even the corpses/Geth remains they came across (or killed) with incredible efficiency. The Asari was also beginning to make him feel inadequate, for although he was considered a good biotic among his people, this Asari was fucking insane at best, considering how easily she put Geth Juggernauts through solid walls and tore apart objects and foes that came in their way. It was almost enough to make him feel fear, almost.

When it came to dealing with the Geth and indoctrinated Salarians that came from the lower level warehouse that they were heading for, Liara's new Stasis came in ridiculously useful, or according to Garrus very annoying "Liara, can we NOT spend our time doing target practice? It's getting a little tedious."

"I think you just need to find more creative ways of killing things, Garrus." Tali called, she was using her laser pistol to test out armour weak points on Geth, when she was done, and after everyone else was done with theirs, Liara deactivated the Stasis and Tali dropped down to investigate "Hmm, so besides the joints, this groove along the belly is a weak points…"

Shepard rolled his eyes before calling the team to move on. They descended a flight of stairs and turned right, finding yet another Salarian locked in a cell, apparently, this was one of the control subjects for the indoctrination experiments. Shepard decided to let the guy out "Liara, give him your pistol, Imness, don't try anything stupid." Shepard gave him another device "put this around your chest, it'll keep you safe." Little did the Salarian know that he was one of the few non-Coalition members to ever be allowed access to Coalition Civilian Armour, used in times of emergency when militias had to be rallied, civilians usually could not handle the standard armours.

* * *

Lieutenant Ganto Imness was lying in his cell, contemplating his impending death and wondering if he should just end it himself when he heard the gunfire in the distance. _Kirrahe did NOT try another assault, it would be suicide!_ That was his first thought, his second was _Wait, that doesn't sound like mass accelerator fire… well most of it doesn't,_ when he listened closer, standing up.

The soldiers that approached seemed friendly, thought they questioned him, they let him out and gave him an odd-looking pistol (it looked more like a shotgun in size and shape) to use, then told him to follow their covert team. They'd also given him a set of armour, with gauntlets, helmet and greaves, to use.

All in all, it was a very lucky day for him, until he realized what had happened to some of his indoctrinated team members. They had been turned into cybernetic monstrosities that tried to attack this covert operations team… Was that a laser bolt? Weren't directed energy weapons too energy-intensive for use except on starships? And his pistol was so powerful too… almost enough to match up to the pulse rifles of the Krogan and the newest weapons the Geth used, which were far superior to typical Geth Pulse Rifles, which in turn were superior to Citadel Races weapons other than Spectre Gear.

He rose out of cover to fire but instead took an enemy Pulse Rifle round to the face… which bounced off a shield bubble that flared into existence for a moment, he blinked before snapping off another shot, blasting a Husk's head off, before ducking back behind cover "Commander Shepard, how powerful are my shields?"

"Not very strong, use your gun cam to fire out of cover." The human replied before standing and firing, heedless of the fire that bounced off his shield. Imness shrugged and almost jumped as a console popped up, projected form his chest, he tapped the highlighted option on the holographic console that said "enable gun cam", then flicked the switch on the gun that his HUD highlighted. He blinked as his right eye's vision field acquired a picture-in-picture box that told him exactly where his gun was pointed ad at what; he poked his hand over his cover and opened fire. It didn't offer nearly as much situational awareness as actually getting up, but it was a very nice ability nonetheless.

* * *

With Liara's now overpowered biotics, the firefight didn't last long, before they proceeded to the next room, which looked like some sort of office, Shepard gestured for Garrus, Wrex and Imness to stay behind before entering the office with Liara and Tali. The first thing he noted was the yellow neutral signature behind the desk, highlighted on his HUD, it said in a fearful voice "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!" before two sky blue hands were raised, empty and shaking, over the desk.

"We won't shoot you if you tell us who you are and what you do here." Shepard said "Are you one of the test subjects?"

The Asari shakily stood up "No, my name is Rana Thanoptis, I'm one of the scientists here, though the position seems far more permanent than I would have liked…" she shook her head, looking down nervously for a moment at the team's guns, which were held at ease.

"What do you research here?" Shepard asked, no point not getting as much knowledge form this Asari as they could.

"I specialize in the effects of indoctrination, the technique used by Sovereign to control its thralls." She then went off on a long description that Shepard decided essentially meant "Stay away from Sovereign and you'll be okay."

"Is there anything else you can give us?"Shepard tilted his head, flaring his menacing optics brighter.

"Well, there's this, it's the access codes to Saren's private lab…" Rana said, rifling through her pockets.

"Thanks, Rana, come with us, we've got a ride waiting for when we blow this place up." Shepard called down another package from the Normandy, which appeared in the quantum storage space he had on his back, he took it out and it unfolded to reveal another suit of Coalition Civilian Armour, which he handed over to Rana. It was pretty obvious how to put it on, so they didn't bother offering help, though Shepard didn't ask anyone to give the Asari a weapon, due to the fact that she was less reliable and Kirrahe had NOT confirmed her identity over the comm. as someone friendly.

The group headed down the elevator to Saren's private lab (Rana showed them when Shepard asked her) without further incident, though Wrex always kept his shotgun trained on an unsuspecting Rana's back.

* * *

"Damn, Shepard, that ship just pulled a turn that would shear any Council ship in half!" Joker reported "it's got nothing on our boys though… oh shit. Ashley, hit it!"

"Sorry, Joker, I don't have a nuke in the silos yet and I never even started a Yolona Oss." Ashley stated sadly, shrugging and pouting.

"Well can you at least launch an Ahwassa or something?"

"That thing's going far faster than any of our things can in-atmosphere, Joker, even Superchargers won't let us catch up unless we're out of atmosphere… It's moving toward Saren's base! Look out, John!"

"Yeah, well, we have what we came for, Ashley, we know what's happening here and why, and we've got all the data Saren had on these facilities, now get us a flight out of here, then go crazy on the base."

"Okay, Shepard. Oh shit, the AA Tower near the back of Saren's base just came online, the extraction Continental is down, repeat, the extraction Continental is down."

"What the fuck…" Shepard asked "What's the power rating on that sucker?"

"12000 damage in 2 seconds, ten second cycling time. Can switch targets within a single charge, it killed both escorting Prowlers as well as the Continental."

"One and a half times a Novax's damage, half the firing time and reload, eh? Well, hold off on sending anything just yet, we're taking that sucker out, unless you feel like using Artillery…"

"Well, if you want to do it on your own…" Ashley trailed off with a wink, causing Liara to have an irrational moment of jealousy before she cleared it out of her head and remembered that they'd been friends for effectively their entire lives (other than the minor age discrepancy between the two) and besides, Ashley and Kaidan were in a relationship…

"Let's get moving boys." Shepard smirked, the mission was about to get a whole lot less boring.

* * *

Geth Destroyers are inherently taller than Coalition Marines, even in armour, though they were quite well-matched in terms of physical strength (despite major differences in protection and durability), so Shepard and co didn't give the three waiting outside the elevator a chance to try to wrestle them before opening fire. The Destroyers had gotten the first shots in, but Shepard's crew had, as usual, the final word in the firefight. Well, not quite, since the last Destroyer sparked in death before it fell, THAT was the final sound of the actual firefight, even though it was because Liara had stuck another Destroyer's remains THROUGH the Geth platform.

After moving through a tunnel (the five Krogan that once blocked the way had become artistic wall ornaments thanks to Liara's biotics, which were sufficient to make both Rana and Imness very scared of the young Asari), the squad came face to head light with a number of Geth plus more than a few Krogan. There were also Geth Hoppers jumping about irritatingly, even Liara's Singularities, Propels and Stasis could not deal with all the enemies quickly enough to turn it into a turkey shoot. This meant that the team actually traded fire with the enemies, who had far more powerful weapons than usual, enough to force the team to actually bother with cover. Finally, Garrus and Shepard's sniper rifles tipped the scales by killing one too many Rocket Troopers and the rest of the Geth that were not biotically occupied were ripped apart after Wrex stopped being suppressed and actually had a chance to bring out his Gauss Chaingun. The frozen/stuck targets, on the other hand, were generally leisurely taken care of, with the exception of two Geth Primes which found themselves brutally shoved into each other's entrails by biotics, though it took a few tries…

"You know, Liara, that reminds me of 69, you do know what that is, right?" Ashley had opened up a girls-only channel between herself, Liara and Tali, after Liara's first attempt at shoving the Geth Primes through one another's guts at the same time while they were flailing around helplessly in the air due to her biotics.

"Well, yes…" Liara said hesitantly, watching the Primes attempt to pry themselves apart, their flashlight heads tuck between one another's legs by the force of the biotics crushing them together.

"I bet you want to try that with John sometime, eh? Be warned though… size matters." Ashley winked just before Tali realized what the girls were talking about and left the channel.

"What do you mean, Ashley? You've tried it with him before?" Liara's voice sounded slightly hostile and defensive. She drew the Primes apart before turning one of them 90 degrees and trying again, it actually hit on target this time… not enough force though…

"Whoa, no need to get jealous, I just accidentally walked in on him changing once, I left right after I noted one way to distinguish him and James."

"Ah yes, John's twin…" Liara said, finally smashing one Prime's head through the other's torso. "What's so different between them?"

"Well, as I said, size matters, look it up on the extranet." Ashley closed the channel, leaving Liara somewhat mystified, she'd look it up later; the mission came first for now.

Shepard led the team (plus two misfits) down toward the geothermal taps that powered the base since it seemed to be a blind spot in the AA grid the Geth had brought online again (Ashley had tested this). The Ilshavohs had been rampaging through the base when suddenly the weird squid-like ship arrived and vaporized the twenty-four Assault Bots and two Athanahs with its weapons, destroying them within two volleys. Shepard ran through the math in his head, it made sense, as the health and shields total was, including personal shields and over-shields, not _that_ much… 240,000 damage points were dealt from the six tentacles of the squid-like ship in ten seconds according to sensors, this was mathematically reasonable and more than enough to kill the attack force, though the damage was dealt so quickly that Shepard figured out exactly why this ship called itself a Reaper… after all, it did deal out 24,000 DPS in 120,000-damage bursts, not bad.

However, surprisingly, that didn't match up to the DPS of a Coalition Battlecruiser unless you included that spinal Mass Accelerator scans had shown. Just the Coalition BC's lasers plus the twenty-one Ravager Point Defences would add up to 16350 (Ravager cycling time has been reduced to 7.5 seconds since the Seraphim War). Add the rest (accounting for the 50% penalty of Zealot SIMs and 75% penalty of Flak against Capital Ships i.e. those above Destroyer size) and you get 28740 DPS. Shepard was uncertain as to how much power that spinal mass accelerator would pack, and he wasn't in favour of shoving a Battlecruiser in front of said mass accelerator to check, after all, a BC only had 120,000 Shields and 180,000 Structural Fields.

* * *

Coalition Military Archive: Weapons Breakdown of a Coalition Battlecruiser

DPS* – Weapons (number)

9000 – Lasers (1 Heavy Microwave Laser, 2 Phason Laser)

900 –Triple Gauss Cannon x3

600 – Dual Plasma Beam x2

1200 – Heavy Oblivion x2

600 - Sonance

300 – Heavy Proton Cannon x4

800 – Plasma Accelerator x2

1440 – Loa Racks 12x4 (600 damage per missile)

7350 – Ravager x 21

1600 – Medium Oblivion x8

7500 – Zealot SIM x25 (50% penalty anti-capital)

4800 – Flak (75% Penalty Anti-Capital)

* DPS is total for that weapon type, for example the three Triple Gauss Cannon turrets each deal 300 DPS because of their slow reload (3000 damage in three shells, one volley per ten seconds). It is also according to Coalition-standard Weapons Rating Scale, 3860 Edition, hence numbers and points.

Note that this is sufficient to handily overwhelm any other known ship so far, excluding Reapers, as that has not been tested or simulated yet. This is also one of the main reasons Hunter Squadrons are so feared outside Coalition Space.

In comparison, Council Dreadnoughts can pull off three 6000-damage rounds per two seconds (A/N: I know this is far faster than in Canon but I have to make them sort of balanced… or what would the niche of Coalition Battleships be?) Add all auxiliary weapons and lasers and you get a little over 12,000 DPS. However their shields have been beefed a whole crapload of a lot since the Turian War (mostly by just scaling the shield emitters up), so they actually come close to Coalition BCs in the balance of things.

* * *

A/N: Yes, there are multiple types of "Codex" in the Coalition, there's the Coalition Codex, the Coalition Military Codex, for less generic information on military units, tactics and technologies, with multiple clearance levels built in, and the Military Archives. The Archives are full of rarely-consulted and mostly classified information such as firepower breakdowns; shield overlay possibilities, old experimental schematics, impractical or obsolete technologies, etc.

* * *

"Dammit… Shepard, I'm sending in the Gemini wings, you go take down that AA Tower, I have the shortest route plotted for you, take down that tower and we'll be able to get you out of there."

"What about using strategic bombers?"

"This base has no structural fields, the bombs would incinerate the whole base in maybe two hits, not a healthy proposition for you, I've put the shortest route from you to the AA Tower on your HUD, get moving…"

"Got it, Ash, I'm going now." Shepard nodded before breaking out into a run, assisted by his armour, the others followed along. They raced past a position once held by a Rocket Trooper, some Troopers and Rocket Drones, gunning them down on the run. Tali located a control console for the AA Tower, but…

"Shepard, the controls are off-line, I can't disable the AA Tower from here. We need to get closer." Tali looked up from her holographic console with a worried frown on her helmet optics.

"Alright, Tali, move, move!" Shepard motioned the squad forward toward the next waypoint on his HUD. They activated the elevator, which began moving up to their level slowly as they kept an eye on their sensors.

"Shepard, Geth Signatures Approaching." Tali reported when the elevator stopped one floor down for a bit.

"Thanks, Tali, this elevator isn't gonna come up empty boys, be ready."

* * *

"I blame you." Wrex deadpanned, nudging Garrus as the elevator shook and rattled downward through the building, the control console sparking once in a while along with the Geth parts that littered the inside.

"Well, your shotgun was the one that made THAT." Garrus pointed towards the largest hole in the elevator's back wall.

"Well maybe I wouldn't have made that if you hadn't insisted on putting a laser bolt through that Geth Shock Trooper's torso thus vaporizing a large hole for my shotgun blast to go through." The Krogan growled in irritation.

"Logic, I'm amazed." Garrus said dryly, Tali, Liara and Shepard were sharing an eye-roll. Then Garrus's optics widened in horror "please tell me it's not from watching too much Star Trek."

"I'm not Vulcan, in case you've gone blind…"

"Well, duh…" Shepard facepalmed at the lameness of what Garrus just said.

DING!

"We're here boys." Shepard announced when the elevator opened up into one of the "trenches" used to breed Krogan, complete with empty tanks along one wall. They ran down the trench, blasting the Geth Hoppers as they went. In reality, it was more of throwing a Singularity like a vacuum cleaner/bowling ball down the trench, then running after said speeding singularity and shooting any Geth that got caught in it as well as whatever it missed, which wasn't much.

The Trench opened up to a large open area, the geothermal tap field of the base, which was guarded by a small horde of Troopers, Shock Troopers, Rocket Troopers and Primes, enough to force the squad into cover due to the enemy's much-improved small-arms. Shepard and Garrus ended up picking off one of the Primes while Liara used the other to rather forcibly club most of the smaller Geth to pieces via biotics. Everyone else more or less sat behind cover and did nothing, letting them have their fun (Tali did deploy sabotage fields, but that was about it) unless a Geth got too close to their cover, in which case said Geth usually quickly found itself resembling a cheese grater (except in Tali or Wrex's case, where they were usually reduced to an explosion of limbs and a head from a center-mass shotgun hit).

Liara was finding her Geth Prime to be a very good tool for bludgeoning, so much that when it finally died from being smashed against objects, Geth and the ground a few too many times she kept it around as a biotic club. Oddly, it took almost no effort for her to keep it up and hovering along behind her. Once they'd gotten this fight over with, they proceeded along the waypoints Ashley had planned out (taking loot along the way) and found themselves in another trench with five Krogan and a bunch of Hoppers. The first thing Liara did was throw the Prime at the Krogan Battlemaster, knocking him to the ground with its superior mass travelling at high speed, and shoot off a wide-area Stasis at the Hoppers to keep them out of the way while the squad engaged the Krogan, who, despite their improved weapons and armour, were still not a match for what were effectively anti-materiel SMALL-ARMS.

"You know, I think these small-arms are Reaper-issue." Rana suddenly piped up while the group was stripping the area of loot, after gunning down everything that was hostile.

"Well, apparently the Reapers believe in small-arms for their infantry, unlike us, our 'small-arms' can take on vehicles." Shepard replied "Which means good for us, bad for them."

The squad went up the stairs to the "wide open spaces" of the great outdoors inside the base just before a Geth Dropship flew overhead and Ashley called in.

"Shepard, Geth are dropping in back at the Geothermal Taps, I can't do anything because of the freaking dogfight in the sky taking up so much energy… hold on, I'm deploying Shockers against that Reaper, sorry, Shepard, watch your back, I'm evacuating the Salarians, I might have to use that Liberator at some point after all."

"What's a Liberator?" Imness asked curiously.

"The Cybran variant of the T3 Strategic Missile Launcher, slightly less durable than the other three but has a specially designed EMP Nuke." Shepard rattled off. "Ash has one prepped and ready to vaporize this base, apparently."

"How'd she get a Strategic Missile Launcher here on Virmire?" Imness gaped, visible through his visor.

"That's for us to know and for you to never find out." Shepard smirked, his helmet optics conveying it in ominous dark red lights.

"John, stop blabbering and get your ass over to that AA Tower to disable it, we haven't got much time before you start fighting a two-front battle, and that'll be a lot harder especially if you decide to call in close air support again!" Ashley said urgently.

"Alright, Ash, I'm going, I'm going… evacuate Kaidan and the Salarians, will ya?"

"Already done, Shepard, just have to get your ass over to the AA Tower, disable it, and we'll be able to get your ass out of there and blow this place to hell."

Shepard began to move "Alright, team, there isn't enough time to go around and salvage stuff, let's get to that AA Tower!" They headed into another elevator, which rose up toward the roof of the base. Thankfully, it was not a Swiss cheese-like deathtrap like the last one had been (no Geth, no shooting, and no holes).

* * *

The squad mowed down several dozen Geth outside the AA Tower before Tali could get close enough to hack into it and start cascade failures in the systems, however, this required that the squad hold their position at least for a while… Unfortunately for them, Saren chose this moment to make an appearance with a bluish hover-platform that would have resembled a Seraphim design were it not for the lack of glowing circuitry. He opened fire on the squad below with biotics while they moved to cover Tali from damage while she remained hooked into the Tower's systems through a direct link, slowly chewing through the firewalls and anti-viral programs. The hail of biotic attacks flailed against Liara's Barrier for a while before they ceased, and Saren landed to begin a conversation.

"I am impressed; Commander Shepard, my Geth and Krogan all thought the walkers were the real threat, though they were quite powerful to stand up to one volley from Sovereign…" Saren trailed off.

"Why did you do this, this…facility, Saren? From what I heard from Nihlus you used to be the go-to guy for jokes among the Spectres, and you used to have the best interests of the galaxy at heart, what changed?"

"Nothing, I merely saw Sovereign's power and was Enlightened to the fact that if we organics are to survive, we must join the Reapers."

"That's bullshit and you know it, Saren, the Reapers wipe out all organic life in the galaxy every fifty thousand years, who's to say they won't just turn on you after you help them out?"

"Sovereign, he will ensure our survival, Shepard, join us, and you and your race will survive the coming days."

* * *

UP above the battlefield, Nazara frowned in irritation _It's "She", you idiot, or at least that's what all the others call me. Of course, I take great pleasure in referring to them as "it", but that's beside the point…_

* * *

"Yeah, sure, have you never watched any movies? All the bad guys say that sort of shit, and then they backstab the people that actually believed them." Shepard said, shaking his head "Sorry, Saren, but Sovereign and by association you must be stopped, and I'll be the one to do it. I hope you understand someday…" Shepard opened up with his LBR just as Saren jumped back onto the platform he had been on and flew to a safe distance before circling the field, riding the platform and using it to dodge/block incoming fire.

"Liara, use Stasis on him!"

The field failed "Sorry, Shepard, that platform is encased with a dampening field, biotics won't work on him!"

"Well then we just have to do this the hard way…" Shepard said, grinning wolfishly and trading out his LBR for his GLMG, it had a better firing rate so was better at dealing with fast targets, even though it was less damaging over a certain time than the ULPA, which balanced the two and served as the main general-purpose machine gun for the Coalition Marines. He took a burst of hits to his over-shield and ducked back behind cover "Hmm, those shots actually did something to the shield bar, I'm amazed." Shepard commented dryly.

It didn't take too long to whittle down the platforms shields (sensors could tell), but then Saren pulled something unexpected. He rammed Shepard, whose over-shields and shields absorbed enough of the force to not be flung off the edge of the shuttle-pad they were fighting on, attached to the AA Tower, but was still driven to the edge, then Saren, in a flying tackle, grabbed Shepard by the shoulders and bodily (surprisingly) pushed him toward the edge of the platform, rolling as they went, embroiled in a fist-fight. The rest of the squad looked on, except Tali, who had just finished breaking down the AA Tower's functionality.

Saren froze as his HUD readout indicated the Tower was offline and Sovereign was beginning to move away, out towards space. Shepard took the opportunity to deliver a right hook to Saren's jaw and throw him off. The former Turian Spectre rolled with the impact and found himself conveniently near his hover-platform, which he grabbed onto and heaved himself onto. The platform took off as Shepard punched the ground. "DAMN! I should have thrown him the other way…" He probably should have thrown him off the platform, but life was irritation like that. "Ash, where's pickup?"

"Well, now that that Reaper's clearing out… and Saren is too, I'll be able to send pickup in just a moment… unless you'd prefer a Restorer to a Continental?"

"Nah, Continentals are much more durable."

"I thought you'd see it my way." Ashley grinned from his HUD display, then the transmission winked out, and the squad sat around and waited. Eventually, once the overhead aerial battle had died down with the Reaper and Saren's ships hounded by hundreds of Geminis and Restorers, another Continental came in overhead, Restorers mowing down any remaining Geth that dared show their heads.

The team and the misfits they'd picked up seated themselves inside the Continental before it lifted off and flew away from the base at maximum speed, Superchargers kicking in on the engine pods to double said maximum speed (Aircraft Speed Upgrades: Afterburners, 1.5x speed, 1.5x fuel consumption, then Superchargers, totalling 2x speed, 2x fuel consumption). Moments after they lifted off, their armours announced the ominous tone of "Strategic Launch Detected". By the time the nuke actually came down on the base behind them, they were far out of the directed blast zone of the Strategic nuke.

"How are the Salarians holding up, Ash? And how's Kaidan?"

"Kaidan's being swamped by Salarians who are scared shitless right now, I think we might have to dump them in the cargo bay and storage bays until we can drop them off." Ashley replied. "I'm getting rid of everything down, turning it back into sand and rocks." She said "See you on the Normandy in a bit, Shepard."

"See you in a bit."

* * *

"Well, that went well, even though we had to nanolathe a washroom inside the cargo bay and lock down the Rhino to prevent them from trying to scan it…" Shepard glowered; it had been a most disturbing surprise as to how the Cargo Bay could fit so many Salarians by constructing additional decks with stairs inside, and how so many could fit in the Range, though the weapons lockers were also locked down. "Joker, let's jump to the Citadel and dump the STG guys, right now. I don't like my cargo bay and range being crowded like the slums of some twenty-first century backwater, there's over six hundred of them on the ship God damn it!"

"Understood, Commander," Joker switched it to the intercom "we will be jumping momentarily, please brace yourselves, thank you." The Salarians grabbed onto whatever handhold they could find, in some cases each other "Jump in five, four, three, two, one."

A momentary vibration of the ship, coupled with a sudden sense of vertigo told them they had jumped. "We're coming in to dock at the Citadel, Commander, please herd the Salarians to the Cargo Bay now."

"Got it, Joker." Shepard replied "Everyone listen up, we've reached the Citadel, if you were part of the Salarian team, please get your asses moving down to the Shuttlebay now. Rana, Imness, give me back your armour…" They did as they were told "thank you, have a pleasant stay on the Citadel."

While his troops disembarked, Kirrahe paused to talk to Shepard "Thank you for your help, Shepard, I and my men will remember your help this day." The Salarian paused, extending his hand "Who knows, we may meet again someday, until then, Shepard."

Shepard took it and shook it firmly "Until then, happy hunting." He nodded, looking the Salarian in the eye, helmet tucked under his left arm. "I'm going to report to the Council about what we found, you going?"

"Nah, we go back to the Citadel STG HQ, see you later." The Salarian left after that.

Shepard turned to his team, who were all watching him expectantly "Let's go tell those idiots on the Council exactly what they need to do…" they cheered "Go get your weapons and armour, fill up all the weapon slots on your armour to make yourself look more intimidating, then get back here." Shepard left with them to the Crew Quarters to pick up his gear, and get additional gear from the armoury on that floor, he decided to bring along his Temporal Fizz Launcher, Infantry Nanodart Launcher and for his third Heavy Weapon… Shepard picked up his CAR. He checked the weapon, and then clipped it onto his armour, picking up his other weapons and also adding them to his armour. Then he put his helmet on and left his room, to meet up with the rest of his shore party in the cargo bay. He would have liked to drive the Rhino up the Presidium Tower to make a point, but alas… it would not fit in the Citadel's corridors.

* * *

COALITION MILITARY CODEX: COALITION CIVILIAN ARMOUR

The origin for the concept of Civilian Armour came about when the Aeon began acquiring the habit of "cleansing" settlements. The other factions needed something that would offer surviving civilians NBCP protection (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical, and Psychic) and a chance to survive until friendly ACU pilots could take back the region from the Aeon. The original Civilian Armours were quite weak, with structural fields only able to take hits from Spirit Land Scouts (or Snoop Land Scouts), being rated at 3 points. However, the armour offered protection from the short-duration, limited fallout of "clean" nukes, bio-hazardous material spills, chemical spills, and psychic attacks. It also allowed some supplies to be stored and included a water filter for long-term survival

Today's Civilian Armour is very different, it is rated to withstand Flare-class Light Assault Bot guns (20 damage per shot, also 20 DPS) and is not much weaker than Light Armour, being rated at 6 over-shield, 10 shield and 5 structural fields, a total of 21. Note that this is enough to withstand 5 shots from a Mech Marine's 70mm "Tomcat Light Machine Guns", which are classed as Assault Cannons by the Citadel Races… O_O

Differences from Light Armour include a simplified user interface, simplified HUD, lack of a strategic control interface (though the situation can still be viewed, control is impossible), lack of armour upgrade options, and lack of Heavy Weapon storage slot. Of course, since all Heavy Weapons come with extendable straps built in, one can sling one over one's shoulder like a guitar using the straps if one needs to, however it isn't as convenient. These simplifications do however make it more convenient for issuing during evacuations or when militia needs to be rallied. The latter has become more important since the colonization of the Skyllian Verge, especially since the Battle of Mindoir. Due to the proliferation of Civilian Armours, not a single civilian has been lost to enemy action in the Verge since Mindoir.

The Civilian Armour includes a scaled-down version of the micro-nanolathe found in other Coalition armours, as well as a "weak" power core. However the lathe and its power supply is still sufficient to provide enough nutrient slush and water to sustain ten men indefinitely. For an active combatant, the lathe can produce medi-gel and omni-gel (the armour has several specialized compartments to hold these substances) in addition to food and water. The power core is also able to power weapons through the standard glove power interfaces, all in all, Civilian Armour is sufficient to sustain medium-intensity urban combat indefinitely.

Aesthetically, the armour embodies all four major styles of the Coalition. The helmet is of the mottled grey typical of UEF designs, with a clear visor able to polarize when it detects a bright flash of light. The torso is in Aeon style for additional comfort and flexibility, the leg plates are in Cybran style to mitigate noise as much as possible (generic recoil dampeners are included in all Cybran-style armour pieces) and the arm plates are in Seraphim style. Circuitry is invisible unless the user is firing a weapon or deploying a tech/biotic/psychic attack, in which case they usually glow dully in assistance of the user.

Compared to most non-Coalition armours, this is Godly. Compared to Coalition Marines Armours, it is fit only for civilians who cannot handle the heavier armours. All Coalition Military starships and installations (including neighbourhood armouries) have large numbers of these in stock to be distributed in times of need. Note however that in times of non-emergency in friendly territory, the Civilian Armour must be returned or released to you by an authorized officer within twelve hours of arrival (or removed by authorized persons such as Medical personnel) or unpleasant side-effects may occur (i.e. the armour will broadcast your location to Coalition Military Police, the mass manipulation tech will increase the mass instead of decrease it, etc.). No one has yet successfully stolen even a single set from the Coalition military.

END OF CODEX ENTRY

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE GO TO "CONTINGENCY PLANS", "EVACUATION PROCEDURES", ETC.

* * *

A/N: I hope I wasn't too disappointing, and yes the STG guys are freaked out by the sheer number of gigantic war machines used by the Coalition, if they only sent one not-so-gigantic ship (Corvettes are small, only about 150 meters long), where the hell did the machines come from?

Also, I didn't realize until I finished the plans how powerful (though short-ranged) Ravagers were even against Capital Ships en masse. Thus I was forced to scale up the Council races' ships because they became rather frantic (or less cautious) in applying new technologies after they came into contact with the Coalition, so a Council Dreadnought hasn't got THAT much in firepower, but it has a hell of a lot more in shields.

Also, expect Sovereign to be a lot more durable than in-game, a LOT more durable, I mean the in-game death of Sovereign was like killing it with a BB gun… LAME!


	28. The Calm Before the Storm

A/N: To anyone who is sceptical of the concept of Coalition Civilian Armour, the Coalition is a peaceful, friendly society, and it has mostly forgiven itself for its past wars, but it will never, ever forget, thus, the Civilian Armour was kept, especially because Quantum storms seem unusually frequent in the Skyllian Verge…

True Bowling Singularity sounds like Shockwave, but note it sucks things in as it goes, not blow them outward. Also, one-village-idiot made a very good point about Star Wars… if I ever decide to write a crossover, the Old Republic in the Clone Wars will be the setting, and of course as we all know they'll get curb-stomped if they try anything (i.e. Palpatine starts a war with the Coalition because the Coalition supported the CIS worlds in resisting Republic corruption).

* * *

Chapter 28: The Calm Before the Storm

_Citadel, July 21, 3868_

After careful deliberation, it was determined that driving the Rhino up the outside of the Presidium Tower would cause too much collateral damage due to the magnetized tracks, inherent high speed, and sheer mass of the tank being able to severely disrupt any windows it ran over that were not parallel to its trajectory. Note that smaller panes of glass risked destruction simply by having the treads move over them, such was the scale of the tank. Also, it was found that marching up the Tower in full armour and weapons would probably be more intimidating to the Council; after all, you could maybe fit one gun barrel of the Rhino inside the Council Chambers, not enough space for the idiots to appreciate the size of the _Medium Tank_.

It was also determined that the Restorer could not even fit its nose into the Council Chambers effectively, so it would not be possible to ram the nose into the Council Chambers and have the whole crew jump out to scare the idiots into doing what was necessary. This was why the group decided on the final option (nicknamed Option Zero for being the crappiest choice).

"You _will_ move out of the way." Shepard flared his optics a dark red in intimidation of the Turian guards that had dared ask the team to relinquish their weapons. "In case you didn't look at your fucking scanner readout, I am Spectre Commander Shepard, Spectres are ALLOWED to bring weapons into the Council Chambers, besides, it's not like those sorry asses don't have a kinetic barrier installed in the floor anyways to protect them."

"Alright sir, alright!" The Turian almost squeaked, causing a grunt of laughter from Wrex.

* * *

"The Council will prepare to fight Saren here, at the Citadel?" Shepard asked, one eye twitching in fury.

"Yes, we have decided that it is wiser to prepare to confront Saren in his plan to attack the Citadel here, AT the Citadel, would you not say that would be the strategically sound option?" The Salarian Councillor was quickly closing in on the "most hated" position; he was just behind the Turian councillor by this point in Shepard's mind.

The Asari Councillor looked slightly reserved, so Shepard decided she would be the best point to force a breakthrough to get through to the three idiots. "Saren's headed for Ilos to find the Conduit, that could mean the return of the Reapers, for all we know, we need to send a fleet to stop him, NOW!" The amplification by the armour meant the shout was amplified greatly in the confines of the Council Chambers, causing the Councillors to clap their hands to the sides of their heads.

"I believe Sun Tzu's Art of War said that it is better to make the enemy run around and exhaust themselves while you wait around in leisure?" The Turian ventured.

Shepard was struck dumb for a moment "You actually read the Art of War? Then you must know that some places cannot be defended effectively, and of course the best defence is to strike first and strike hard."

"What if, when we launch our attack on Ilos, Saren arrives here at the Citadel in his own pre-emptive strike, having lured you away with the legend of the Reapers?" The Turian countered.

"Hmm, nice, oh, let me think, how about me and my crew go to Ilos? You guys can stay here." Shepard said sarcastically, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"No, we need everyone possible here when Saren comes, Shepard, your ship isn't half bad. The Normandy could really come in useful in the fight ahead." The Turian almost sounded sincere.

"I see there is no point listening to you idiots anymore, Joker, prep the ship, we're heading out." Shepard turned and trooped out, pulling his LSMG off his back and tapping it in his other hand in a gesture of threat to the guards, who stepped out of the way without a sound, trying to seem inconspicuous to the supremely pissed crew of seven elite soldiers that marched from the Council Chambers, each palming a weapon or in Liara's case holding a ball of biotic energy above one hand and her PSMG in the other.

"I'm afraid that won't be possible, Commander." Ambassador Udina chose that moment to get in the way.

"And why not, Ambassador?" Shepard's voice sent a shiver down Liara's spine, it was probably the most deadly thing she'd heard in a while.

"Because the Normandy is currently on lockdown and the Quantum Core has been removed for routine maintenance." Udina grinned wolfishly.

Shepard threw his arms up in disgust "You know, with people like this piece of garbage, I don't know why I even want to save the galaxy anymore." He rolled his eyes, meleed Udina across the face with his LSMG (spinning the bastard around and knocking him out with one swing), and walked on "Come on, boys; let's get Anderson to deal with this scumbag."

* * *

"Elite Commander Dostya! It is good to see you again." Shepard was quite surprised to see the famous Cybran commander here on the Citadel.

"Same to you, John." The brunette nodded, she'd stopped using the white streaks in her hair after the Seraphim War or more accurately when she got tired of the nickname "The white-haired girl" or among the Commanders of Chinese descent _Bai Fa Mo Nü_ or "The White-Haired Witch".

"Doctor Brackman and the various nodes have collaborated to provide you with some new hardware, which is being loaded onto the Normandy as we speak." The Russian-accented woman told him.

"That's great, Elite Commander, but… The Normandy's been locked down and the Quantum Core removed, so we can't jump to Ilos anyways… and Udina was the one who did the lockdown just because the Council said they wanted me to stay here. I'm going to Flux for a drink, the galaxy can save itself." He said, shoulders slumping "If you and Captain Anderson could join us, that would be nice…"

* * *

"You finally found a nice girl, eh John? Hannah was talking to me the other day and she was worried about you dying a virgin." Dostya chuckled after her fifth drink of the outing, John had danced with Liara for a little while before they'd managed to grab him over and Liara went over to share some girl talk with Ashley and Tali. "Seems like I was right when I told you you'd find someone sooner or later, probably sooner… This place is real nice, no fucking reporters hounding me every time I step out of Coalition HQ or a Central Gate Complex on some Gate Hub or Gate World. I should probably spend more time vacationing here after we deal with Sovereign."

"Right, Shepard, I have a proposition, I can get the Normandy up in the air again easily enough, but the question is: are you willing to take her out and deal with that bastard and that 'Reaper'" Anderson used air quotes "Once and for all?"

"No problem, Captain, you can count on me…" They two had plied Shepard with just enough alcohol for him to agree to the pseudo-psychotic proposition of going after a Battlecruiser or Battleship-class vessel with only a Corvette. Of course, this necessitated overwhelming the Cybran implants and genetic modifications humanity had done to itself after the Quantum Age, but that wasn't THAT difficult.

"Alright, Shepard, go back to your ship, me and Dostya will just discuss it for a second before we go meet Udina, be ready to leave in one hour… Always wanted to introduce that politician to my fist…"

"Yeah, we should go cop the greedy UEF bastard real nice and good, no offence, David."

"I'm Aeon, unless you've forgotten?"

"Oh, right, sorry."

"It's nothing; let's go deal with Udina… good, John's left with his girlfriend and crew." David said, looking around furtively. "Let's go hunt down the bastard."

* * *

"So, Mr. Saracino, you are asking me for support in the next election…" Shepard was wondering if in real life you could get away with those Renegade interrupts so popular in RPG game he had played. If he could, this guy would be a piece of rapidly cooling meat by now. "So let me get this, you don't like the Coalition policy toward alien races, and that we should resist alien influence?"

"Yes."

Shepard was puzzled "Why aren't you protesting outside Coalition HQ?"

The man shrugged "The Seraphim Republic and UN of Drell are members of the Coalition, what I don't support is the Coalition's ass-kissing of the Council…"

Shepard nodded "Yeah, Ambassador Udina locked down my ship simply because the Council said so, though Dostya and Anderson are going to deal with him soon…"

Saracino appeared shocked "Dostya? Elite Commander Dostya?"

Shepard shrugged "Yes, but if you irritate her she'll probably kill you, so stay out of her way, Mr. Terra Firma."

"Alright, Commander, but what do you say? Are you willing to make a statement to endorse me in the next election?"

"Hmm… let me think." Shepard's eyes drifted over to Liara, who unlike him was wearing her helmet still. _Dude, I've got an Asari girlfriend, do you expect me to support you racists?_ "No."

"Would you at least make a statement to support my candidacy as the first human Spectre?"

"Listen here mister, racists like you belong in the past, there is nothing wrong with the Coalition's policy toward the Council other than Ambassador Udina, the Coalition is still recovering from the Wars." Ashley snapped, Shepard gave her a look that said "Stand down, I'll deal with this bastard."

_And allow racists like you to run for a seat on the UEF Parliament? I know you were a decent Commander in your day but your attitudes… unacceptable._ "I'm sorry, Mr. Saracino, but I cannot, now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go save the galaxy."

"Of course, sir, thank you for your respect for the democratic process." Saracino shook Shepard's hand before going back to his protest.

Shepard mentally snorted, thinking _I still prefer the Cybran Network system of direct democracy_ "Let's go guys, back to the Normandy."

* * *

"Joker, make sure we have a route plotted to the Relay that will take us near the Mu Relay, then hustle there so we can get to Ilos."

Joker turned to look at the Commander "Warp or ME FTL?"

"ME until we're out of the vicinity of the Citadel, then go to warp."

"Alright, Commander, course plotted, all we have to do is wait for the docking clamps to let us go… too bad we can't just quantum-jump to the Mu Relay…"

"Well, Udina's a bitch, no doubt about it." Shepard switched on the intercom "Everyone, prepare to leave the Citadel and jump as soon as the docking clamps release us, make sure you are not caught doing overly delicate tasks, and ground team, get some rest, we have a major mission ahead of us on Ilos."

* * *

_One Hour After Events in Flux…_

"Hello, Captain Anderson…" Udina said greasily.

"Hello, Ambassador, we'd like to ask when you gained the right to interfere with military operations…" Anderson asked politely.

"My task here is to further relations with the Citadel Council, not to listen to a madman's blabbering, Captain… wait, we?" The politician frowned, just before Dostya, cloaked in her Cybran Heavy armour, slapped him with an armoured hand and picked him up by the scruff of his shirt, uncloaking.

It was thus that Donnel Udina found himself face-to-face with one of the few known Commanders to be ranked above the Elite Four, watching him with an expression of utter calm. "You will release the Normandy right now, Ambassador, understood?"

"But Coalition High Command…"

"I AM High Command, well Rhiza, Hall and Ratheen are on the Military High Command too but that's beside the point. You will obey my commands, got it?" the Cybran arched an eyebrow.

"Sorry, but the quantum core of the Normandy has been removed for refit…"

Dostya leaned toward the man's ear "You seem to have forgotten something Udina, all our ships are built with Mass Effect cores and, since contact with Raynor's Raiders, Warp Drives as well… You seem to have spent too long here on the Citadel…" She landed the first strike, a knee to Udina's belly, driving the breath from the man.

"It's too bad she demanded right to first strike, Udina," Anderson shook his head sadly "but…" He gave Udina a vicious right hook to the eye and followed up with an uppercut, which landed the Ambassador flat on his back.

"Get up you son of a bitch." Dostya sounded eerily calm as she dragged a dazed Udina upright "You'd think this would hurt, Udina, but you have so little in the way of balls it probably won't." She introduced her armoured foot to Udina's crotch hard enough to send the man flying several feet, curling up in mid-air due to the pain, screaming his head off, before hitting the ground writhing in pain.

"Anderson, go release the Normandy, I'll take it from here…" Dostya stepped toward the man, her armour clunking against the ground (she'd turned off the recoil/impact dampeners for intimidation) as she walked toward the still-screaming man. The last coherent memory Udina had was of a shadow falling over him, followed by an armoured hand picking him up and another smashing into his face.

* * *

"We're free, gun it Joker!" Shepard shouted theatrically, it was always nice to find the humour in any situation, after all.

"Going! We're dodging the Citadel Security Fleet… We're clear, going to ME FTL!" Joker announced before bringing his fist down on the big red holographic button.

"Alright, Joker, what's our ETA to the Mu Relay?"

"Nine hours, Commander, at our current power readout, that quantum core really counted for a lot of our power generation…"

Shepard frowned "Damn, you sure we can't push the warp drive any higher?"

Joker looked up at the man "If you want us to actually get to Ilos instead of causing a power outage and ending up waiting for a tug, no."

"Alright, Joker, I gotta see how the squad is doing with their new gear anyways… Dostya really brought us some good stuff this time."

"Doesn't she always?"

"Good point, Joker, I'll see you around."

* * *

Wrex and Garrus were the only ones still in the range testing out their newest armour add-on and contemplating the battle ahead, or rather, the probable ease thereof. Seeing no point in disrupting their practicing, Shepard decided to head back to his room after getting some more practice; apparently the other team members had finished learning the simple controls and gone back to their rooms too.

* * *

WARNING: SEXUAL ACTIVITES AHEAD, IF YOU ARE UNDER 16, PLEASE LEAVE (that is the minimum age to get married, so I don't get why M-rated is 17+, if you don't like it, don't read it. Of course, the warning only encourages readers.)

This is my first attempt at writing anything remotely sexual, I hope it's not too terrible, and it's mainly designed to focus on plot elements and thoughts as opposed to actual sex, and it's more lovemaking than sex.

* * *

The door swished open for Liara, since Shepard had never locked it "Shepard? May I speak with you?"

Shepard turned around from his contemplation "I was just thinking about you…"

"I have been thinking about you too. And what we are about to face." Liara paused for a moment "I do not know what will happen on Ilos. I hope we will stop Saren, of course, but part of me fears we are already too late. There is something I must tell you, in case we fail."

"We're not going to fail, between your enhanced biotics and the Normandy's weapons, including the SCU, Restorer and Rhino, we'll send Saren packing, I promise"

"Please, I am not looking for comfort, Saren might already have the Conduit. It is time to be completely honest with each other. These could be our last moments together" _I've seen the Normandy's statistics, and the statistics we have on Sovereign… we'll be absurdly outmatched, Shepard._ Liara took a small step closer to the man she had somehow over the last moths fallen in love with… _falling in love, what an oxymoron of an oxymoron, talking about falling when it is one of the most uplifting sensations ever, unless something happens, in which case…_ "Our last chance to show each other how we feel…" She took another small step forward "I want this to be special"

Shepard had a feeling this was a critical point in their relationship, so he chose his words cautiously "I want this, Liara, I do, but are you sure you're ready?" She had after all told him she wanted to wait until this mess was dealt with, the last time they came close to physical intimacy.

"I have never been more sure of anything in my life. Will you join with me, Shepard, let our bodies and minds unite?"

Shepard followed what his instincts were telling him for once, which was a resounding _Yes!_ "Just tell me what to do."

For all practical purposes, she pounced on him, kissing him with a fervour that seemed far more urgent than any of their previous kisses, which were generally sweet, loving and gentle. This time, she was passionate, needy, and predatory all at once, it was certainly different from her usual style, though John wasn't sure which he liked more.

Somehow, without breaking apart, they managed to divest themselves of a rather large number of items of clothing, including holsters, Civilian Armour plates (standard uniforms inside Coalition starships and installations), though eventually they broke apart for air and to remove the clothes that could only be removed over their heads. When they were finished with removing most of their clothes, everything except John's boxers, which were noticeably tented by now, Liara put her arms around John's neck again and looked into his eyes, whispering the traditional words, "Embrace Eternity…" just before she closed her blue-green eyes and reopened them, showing nearly fully black with only a hint of blue-green around the edges.

Shepard's entire perception of the world changed in that moment, he could feel Liara's thoughts and emotions as if they were almost his own, it felt as if there was a more-or-less Liara-shaped extension to himself he had never felt before… _Yes, John, this is what I meant when I told you a Union was far more than a simple melding…_ the message was not so much in words as in something that he perceived inside his head, and it seemed to be Liara's voice, but at the same time, it felt like talking to himself, he suddenly had many extra memories, as well as another consciousness sharing his mind.

_Liara?_ He asked himself, or rather themselves, it was really quite similar to descriptions of Cybran melding… except for the fact that his firewalls were holding back a darker undercurrent (which simply dissipated when it hit the firewall but did not strengthen in blast strength) to the loving meld. _Do you feel anything out of place?_

_No, should I?_ She sounded awfully concerned, and John knew it to be completely true, she had no idea what was being received and blocked by his body. It was probably a side-effect of an Asari melting with a Cybran anyways. Somehow, he managed to keep that thought from her.

_Nah, it's just my firewalls acting up again…_ he said, pulling her body closer and locking lips with her again. It felt almost like an out-of-body experience, like he was being kissed and doing the kissing twice over, the tactile input was high enough to be nearly surreal. _This is amazing… I bet this was what it felt like for those Adjutants with Raynor's Raiders when they first woke up with bodies of bio-synthetic fusion…_

_You have firewalls?_ Liara asked, and he felt surprise. _I agree, Shepard, this shared tactile input is indeed a rather interesting experience… I wonder what it would feel like if…_

Shepard mentally (and physically) grinned goofily _It seems human females according to lore and Asari are not so different after all, Liara. Sit down and let me do the work, relax…_ She sat on the edge of the bed while he sank to his knees and began putting his tongue to good use. _Oh my fucking God… I never knew it would be like this for women… none of those "training films" ever got the point across. Lack of body hair just enhances it…_ He thought as he received the pleasurable tactile input from his tongue work on Liara's body. It seems that the rumours were true, Asari do have the same erogenous zones as humans, well at least human women, but that's beside the point… He finally landed a stroke over Liara's labia and blew gently on them to test the feeling, resulting in a groan from both of them at the sudden cold and Liara putting a hand on his head and pulling him closer.

_Yes, it is like this for us, though I am not exactly a woman, now you get your tongue moving down there._ Liara commanded playfully, letting out a soft groan from the back of her throat as John complied, making his own pleasured noises as the sensory input was shared. She could feel how warm and wet she was through his tongue and the bottom half of his face, and it made her even wetter, though that bit was far overshadowed to how good his tongue was.

_I'd like to ask, does sharing sensory input mean sharing orgasms and are Asari multi-orgasmic?_ Shepard asked, nuzzling Liara's clit, which was found exactly where a human's would be, with his nose while probing deeper with his tongue, worming it into her against her muscles' resistance. It was very pleasurable, and he understood why most women he'd seen on vids ("Training Films" was naval slang all the way from the twentieth century for porn) seemed so eager for men to go down on them. He intensified his work, determined to make her cum at least once before they got to the main act, and added fingers.

It was a while before Liara responded _No, we don't share orgasms, they build up separately, but yes, we are multi-orgasmic._ Liara was getting very close, but she was also wondering why he was asking when she got her response, Shepard pulled his tongue out of her, laid the underside of the organ against her clit and discharged his tongue and finger circuits at a very low voltage, not enough to cause pain but enough to drive her over the edge.

Shepard shuddered as Liara's back arched, her hips thrusting forward into his face, trying to drive it deeper into her. He was affected too by the pleasure input, but since Asari didn't share orgasms, no need to worry about shooting off too early…

_Shepard, let's do it the way humans do, I did some research, so let's see…_ Liara sent him a set of mental instructions, so he laid on his back on the bed and she stood at the end of the bed, looking at his tool with an apprehensive look _Wait, maybe that wouldn't be such a great idea… I have basically no experience at this…_ She decided against her earlier thought and instead crawled up Shepard's body slowly and seductively until she finally lowered her lips to his (which, along with the bottom half of his face, looked like a glazed doughnut and was similarly delicious), moments before he wrapped his arms around her and carefully rolled them over on a mental prompt. _That's better, you take charge, Shepard. I'm not too familiar with how humans do this sort of thing… ooh…_

Liara promptly informed Shepard through the bond that she was beginning to understand why Asari sex toys were generally phallic objects, despite the Asari not having phallic objects in relationships until they first came into contact with the Turians. Shepard kept up the tender lovemaking and steady rhythm, using his hands and mouth to speed Liara along, but he was beginning to wonder why that firewall in his brain was still constantly dissipating the constant flow of dark, harmful energies that flowed at it. It was probably nothing to worry about, as long as the energy didn't come close to overwhelming his firewall, which it wasn't, and did not increase in flow rate to be faster than his firewall could siphon and disperse… _By the way, Liara, sorry if I'm a bit short…_

Liara frowned _I don't think you're too short, Shepard, it's pretty good as far as I'm concerned, and you're really skilled at this, despite being a virgin, well, not anymore…_

Shepard suddenly took on a worried tone _You won't get pregnant from this, right? Shouldn't we use protection?_

_Relax, Shepard,_ Liara said jokingly, savouring the feeling of being loved mentally and physically, _Asari only get pregnant when we really will it to be so, that's when the Union deepens to allow reading and assimilation of genetic data into our egg cells. I might want to have children with you sometime in the future, but not yet, Shepard._ She was suddenly worried, since most males of any species didn't like discussing children during the first time…

John blinked in surprise at where his train of thought had gone _You know, children with you for some reason doesn't sound as scary as any children at all would for an average Cybran under fifty or so years of age… but you're right, maybe in the future, like a few decades or a century in the future maybe?_

_That sounds like a good proposal, Shepard…_ She trailed off. _Ugh…_ She climaxed just before Shepard did, so when Shepard finally came she simply laid back and groaned pleasurably at the feeling of him splashing into her. They simply laid in each other's arms and enjoyed the other's presence before they fell asleep, nestled against one another.

* * *

Shepard woke up six hours later from his brain's internal alarm clock mechanism, slowly extracting himself from Liara's embrace and the tangle of limbs they'd ended up being. He needed to go check on the rest of the squad, get them up and ready, and figure out exactly what that constant pressure on his firewalls had been.

He headed down to the cargo bay first, to apply all the upgrades he could to the Rhino and Restorer before the mission on Ilos, he had a feeling both would come in particularly useful in their own ways. Then he went to each squad member's room to ensure they had the latest armour upgrade Dostya had shipped, finally, he went to the Mess for food before heading back to his room with two containers of food, ignoring Joker's snarky remarks about him and Liara.

* * *

Liara rolled over, sighing contentedly at the scent of her lover, then frowned at the lack of a warm body on Shepard's side of the bed, she opened her eyes and pushed herself up on her elbows, looking around for her lover before she sat up, seeing Shepard leaning against the desk, on the close side of the bed to her and the door, right beside the wall to the bathroom.

Her skin still had a light purple glow to it "By the Goddess… that was incredible, Shepard."

Shepard smiled lovingly, watching her eyes and trying to keep from ogling his nude girlfriend too much "You were incredible, Liara."

Joker chose that as a cue to interrupt the loving moment, apparently, because the intercom blared on again "Thirty Minutes ETA to the Mu Relay."

Liara looked down for a moment "I had better go. Duty calls. You would not want to keep Joker waiting…" she winked.

Shepard grinned "I can hear his snarky comments already" he shook his head. "Come on, Liara, eat with me?"

"Certainly, Shepard, I'd like that." She took the proffered food container, popped open the lid, and inhaled the scent "This smells quite good, what is it? Oh, never mind, it's Calamari." She'd looked at the side of the container, where the word was scribbled in Gardner's flowing script.

Shepard looked aghast, forkful of food frozen halfway to his mouth "Gardner…" he hissed, his facial circuitry glowing brighter for a moment in fury.

"Shepard, is something wrong?"

"No, it's just that Calamari are a type of or sometimes another name for… squid."

"Oh, right, the derogatory name for Asari among humans… squid-heads…" Liara looked down at the container on Shepard's desk for a moment before shrugging "Thessia has similar seafood, and this is damn good if I do say so myself" she had adopted a fake accent. "So who cares?" She resumed eating with gusto.

They sat in a comfortable silence as they finished their food, Liara playing with her fork, before she looked up at Shepard, who was watching her with an adorable loving expression plastered on his face "Shepard?"

"Yes, Liara?" Shepard was about to put the helmet of his customary Cybran Heavy armour back on.

"Whatever happens on Ilos… I just wanted to say… Thank you, for everything." Liara finished putting on her clothes and left, but not before another searing kiss was shared between the two "I'll see you in the cargo bay, Shepard."

* * *

A/N: I just realized something… The Presidium Park thingy is going to need to be a LOT bigger for the Rhino to jump in, ah well, so mote it be.

Also, I hope the interactions during the loving scene weren't too disappointing, and believe me it will become hugely important during Mass Effect 2 events.


	29. THIS is Ilos?

A/N: For the record, I don't use betas, so there may be minor grammatical errors; please feel free to point them out (though flaming will be returned by Tali's heavy weapon).

Also, in case you didn't notice back then (thanks for the PM uncovering my forgetting to remind you earlier), Chapter 2: The Gathering Storm has a passing mention of finding the Koprulu Sector, so expect occasional Starcraft items here, or at least, items from my SupCom: Koprulu Sector fic, if you haven't seen it yet, go check it out, it's set after this in time as in a couple weeks later but will mention a few things that matter.

As for the Normandy following canon, there are ways, and believe me the Collectors are going to be (slightly) more challenging than the Geth, though the Coalition's constantly advancing technology will likely "even things out" by the time ME 2 rolls around.

By the way, I aim to create a chain of loosely connected fanfics crossing over SupCom (my version, which adds the Seraphim Republic as a major faction and UN of Drell as a minor faction) and various other games so don't be too shocked at what Vigil mentions in passing, it will become significant in a few years' time, fic-wise (in reality, I write a great deal faster than that).

* * *

Chapter 29: THIS is Ilos?

_Ilos, July 22, 3868_

"Looks like Earth did back in 3848." Shepard commented, looking at the scan data on Ilos as they appeared in-system, stealth already online, since they could not afford the power drain that came with cloaking, having lost the Quantum Core, the main power source for the "small" corvette. Most of the surface was covered in swathes of glass while wildfires still burned visible on the dark side of the planet, fuelled by whatever vegetation was still on the surface, since according to the increased oxygen levels few respiring animals were still in evidence. All in all, Ilos was very similar to Earth in the days of Operation Overlord, after the planet was burnt to ashes and glass by the enormous fleet of Ahwassa Experimental Bombers carpet-bombing it.

"Looks a lot worse than Tuchanka did last time I was there though…" Wrex stated before frowning "Isn't Earth the human homeworld Shepard?"

"Yes, Wrex, my species' homeworld once looked like that" Shepard waved at the hologram dismissively "Twenty years ago, but we've fixed the mess up since then, with a LOT of help from the Seraphim Separatists, or rather Republic now. It's mostly back to how it used to be, which was almost like how it was back before the Industrial Revolution, re-terraforming is still on-going though, it'll likely take another five or ten years before the planet's completely back to the way it used to be, and even then the forests are gonna be out of whack for a while since there aren't any old trees left."

"So you're saying the Coalition turned something that looked like THAT" Wrex pointed "Into a nearly pristine planet within twenty years?" The Krogan was starting to scare Garrus with how widely he was _gaping_ at Shepard, which in itself was a scary concept, a Krogan _gaping_.

"Well, more or less, anyways, let's get our asses moving, Joker, what's the situation?"

"There's a lot of Geth Dropships in orbit, Shepard, the Normandy could probably take all of them in a stand-up fight but we'll be spotted." Kaidan reported from his bridge station, Ashley was in control of weapons, Kaidan of shields and such, and Joker flying, usually, though Pressly could fill in any one of the tasks if it was needed while the Commander was groundside, in addition to coordinating with the fleet if there was one.

"Hmm, well, let's drop ourselves right on top of Saren, shall we?"

Pressly turned, worried "The Restorer isn't stealthed though, sir, are you sure…"

"I think Joker can swoop in low enough that we can deposit the Restorer beneath enemy radar coverage and drop the Rhino from it, then it can give us air cover while the Normandy deals with those five Dropships."

"Well, that could work sir…" Pressly said, looking thoughtful.

Shepard grinned "Let's do it. Ashley, Kaidan, you two stay here and baby-sit Joker and the ship, the rest of you, with me."

* * *

The Restorer made its way through a narrow canyon before Shepard reacehd his destination, the bunker Saren and the Geth were last detected near, overhead, the Normandy was already engaging the Dropships with its weapons. "Hoorah!" Shepard yelled as he pulled another perfect landing right in front of the enormous tunnel entrance Saren and the Geth had disappeared into.

"I'm really beginning to love this tank… we have the heavy weapons we need to get through that door now!" Garrus said, grinning. "No need to go around hacking consoles like some dumb RPG… Ow, what was that for?" Tali had whacked the back of his helmet.

"RPG's are NOT dumb!" Tali insisted.

Garrus shrank back away from Tali "Alright, Tali, alright…" Wrex laughed at this.

"Damn, the guns are not identifying the doors as discrete targets… screw this, manual controls are so much better… ah, there we are…" Shepard said, blasting holes into the doors easily with the particle cannons, finally melting out large enough a chunk of bunker door for the Rhino to fit through into the oddly spacious place that seemed like an archive center.

"You know, these creepy underground spaces would make for a good ambush, too bad we have overwhelming firepower, range, protection, mobility and Intel advantage over the Geth." Tali noted, looking around the virtual environment system on the inside of the Rhino. They went down a ramp before Liara made a comment.

"What are those things on the walls?"

Shepard put a cursor over one of the pods "Sensors are designating them as Prothean Stasis Pods."

"They were probably trying to keep themselves alive that way…" Tali said sadly.

After running over three Geth Rocket Troopers completely by accident (they didn't even notice the Rocket Troopers until the Rhino was parked on top of them), the squad found the Rhino slowed down by some sort of force field. "It's a trap!" Garrus and Wrex chorused at once before glaring at one another in irritation.

"It's probably not the Geth or Saren, and neither of you is likely to be Ackbar." Shepard deadpanned "Looks like that elevator's still open though, let's go check it out. The field isn't REALLY strong enough to hold the Rhino if we gun it anyways, can't hurt to see what wants to talk to us."

* * *

"You are neither Prothean nor machine, as was expected…" the badly damaged hologram said.

"It appears to be a badly damaged VI, guys, far below the computing capacity of a single Cybran Symbiont, not much to worry about."

"I do not sense the taint of indoctrination upon you, unlike that other, that passed so recently, there is still hope after all."

"Why can we understand you?"

"It seems your friend here, who seems to be partially bio-synthetic fusion, though different in type from the Reapers, is translating this through his comm. array and brain, which holds the Cipher… curious."

"Can you stop sounding like Doctor Brackman and tell us who you are?"

"I was created here in the final days of the final Protheans, my personality matrix was imprinted off of that of Ksad Ishan, chief researcher of this facility. My name is Vigil, this place is safe for now, but soon, nowhere will be safe."

Tali stepped forward "Why did you try to stop our Rhino?"

"Is that what it was called? It was certainly a most impressive vehicle, probably enough to outdo the most powerful of the Prothean land vehicles from back in the day…" Vigil replied. "The cycle must be broken; it has gone for millions of years, with only a single hiccup one hundred thousand years before present, fifty thousand years before the time of the Protheans."

"What caused this 'hiccup'?" Shepard asked, narrowing his eyes.

"It was then that the Forerunners beat back the Flood by firing the Halo Array, as they called it, wiping out almost all sentient life in the galaxy… You must understand however, that you must not make the same mistakes with the Reapers as the Protheans did." Vigil paused "The Citadel is and has been the center of Galactic civilization for many cycles. It is an enormous trap, a mass relay leading to dark space, where the Reapers wait between the cycles for their vanguard to open the Citadel Relay."

"Most of the Citadel Council's fleets are indeed concentrated there… and that is the seat of the Council." Shepard mused, keeping to himself that most of the galaxy's REAL hitting power was garrisoned in Coalition Space

"That is the problem. The Prothean leaders were dead before anyone knew what was happening, armed with maps and census data of the Prothean Republic, the Reapers systematically wiped out my creators' civilization. Colonies were isolated and picked off by closing the Mass Relays" Shepard was very glad for Quantum and warp FTL now "Indoctrinated Protheans were allowed to go as 'refugees', serving the role of sleeper agents." Shepard grinned behind his locked helmet optics, all Coalition civilians were trained to resist, and Civilian armour offered psychic protection, also, sensors could easily detect indoctrination even mixed in with the masses.

"What about the Conduit, what does it have to do with anything?" Shepard pressed the VI.

"It was a prototype Mass Relay to the Citadel, bypassing defences, the Protheans were on the cusp of unlocking the technology when the Reapers invaded."

"Pretty important project then, how did Ilos survive?"

"All records of the project were destroyed in the initial attack, the Reapers had no knowledge of the planet, the researchers here went into cryo-stasis and eventually the power core began to wind down, I was forced to shut the pods down one by one, in the end, once the Reapers left, only the twelve top researchers remained of the Prothean civilization."

"What sort of power source did you use? The quantum core system from any of the Coalition of Species' vehicles can self-repair and self-maintain… That Rhino Medium Tank we drove in here has a power system that could have kept this whole facility online… though you'd have to turn off the shields, over-shields, structural fields and pretty much everything except the self-maintenance routines, and yes we have used Chronotron tunnel dilation effects to test the tech, it held up to 1500 years subjective time without degradation…" Shepard stated, Vigil's claim was completely ridiculous!

"Well we never developed nanolathing! And the Seraphim simply up and left because they didn't want to 'corrupt the Way by waging war'! So what did you expect? I did what was necessary to give you subsequent civilizations a chance!" Vigil sounded angry now.

"So that was why the Seraphim said they 'returned' to Seraphim II later…" Shepard mused. "I believe you, Vigil." He looked up at the hologram "What do we need to do?"

"The scientists used the Conduit to get to the Citadel, they knew the Prothean race was doomed, so they laboured for years to stop the cycle, the altered the Citadel's signal to the keepers, who were no longer able to activate the Relay, this was why Sovereign has yet to activate the Relay via the Keepers. I have a file for you which will temporarily allow you full access to the Citadel's resources, but you must find the Master Control Terminal, follow Saren, he knows where to go."

"Understood, Vigil, upload yourself to my suit's computing pods and we can get moving, there's more than enough room…"

Vigil was silent for a moment "Saren still has not reached the Conduit, there is still time, alright, I'm transferring now." Shepard's palm interface glowed as it absorbed the VI's code and data. "I am afraid I cannot do much more, since most of my history files are also down, for example, I do not know who exactly the Forerunners were or where their installations are…"

Shepard and co. had by now crammed into the elevator again "Yet you kept yourself, the last legacy of the Protheans, intact, despite the base's failing power level. That is all that can be asked of you."

"Even with all their knowledge and power, the Protheans still fell for the Reapers' traps…" Tali shook her head.

"We have no intention of ending up the same way." Wrex rumbled before the elevator door dinged open. They jumped back onto the Rhino and the field dissipated, then the Tank was giving new headings and more-or-less silently moved off.

"This is a pretty powerful vehicle." Vigil commented, interfacing with the tank through Shepard's armour "It will be able to get us to the Conduit well enough, I've already laid down the nav points you'll want to follow."

"No problem, Vigil, let's get into that trench…" They ran over another three Rocket Troopers without slowing down and entered the trench, opening fire on the Geth Colossus as soon as they acquired a target, and stopping out of range of the other Geth. The Rhino took a few seconds to whittle down the Colossus before the tank abruptly accelerated again and took the turn, running over the smaller Geth easily.

They followed Vigil's nav points and ran over some more Geth along the way, Rampaging through the trench like a force of nature, until they sighted another Colossus with some smaller Geth platforms at the last intersection before the straight run to the Conduit. Shepard grinned and stared at the Colossus's bright optic, which seemed to narrow just before it fired off its first siege pulse. Shepard gunned the engine and charged the much taller machine, which took slightly too long to realize what Shepard was about to do.

Shepard swung the tank into a hard left just as it neared the T-intersection and the Colossus's eye light widened in shock. The tank's treads scrabbled for purchase on the dusty ground, throwing up pavement as it ground up Geth that drifted under it. The Rhino Medium Tank finally ended its drift with hitting the wall on its right side, smashing the Colossus against the wall and snapping it to pieces with the sheer force of impact. The machine had been swept off its feet by the Rhino's cannons already before Shepard threw the turn and squashed the somewhat disabled Colossus absolutely flat against the wall of the Trench right before the Rhino roared off toward the Conduit.

Vigil chose that moment to warn them "The Conduit's power will run out in 20 seconds if we cannot make it there in time… GO GO GO!"

Shepard put the Rhino on a direct course for the Conduit, completely ignoring the four Geth Colossi between them and the structure; he pushed the engines beyond their safety limits as the tank roared along at almost 300 km/h toward the tall spire. Liara was even desperate enough to deploy her biotics to keep the Mass Effect fields on the Conduit up.

"There's not enough time… wait, that won't work…" Vigil started before the Conduit suddenly glowed brighter and Liara began trembling from the exertion "Oh… you are… one of them… thought you were a human, like him here in this suit… right, this could work then, assuming you're still young and powerful."

"Vigil," Shepard said through tightly gritted teeth as Tali kept the core output up through a lot of hard work and he kept his eyes focused forward "Shut the fuck up, that's my girlfriend we're talking about."

"Your mate, you mean." Wrex added that helpful tidbit of information.

"She is your mate? From her power readings… oh, OH! That could work, indeed…" Vigil suddenly realized something and fell silent. The Rhino flew up the incline to the Conduit like it wasn't there and was launched across the galaxy in a flash, the Conduit finally powering down several seconds after the launch, and after Liara stopped feeding it energy.

* * *

_Citadel, July 22, 3868_

The Relay Monument on the Citadel glowed brightly for a moment, causing the two Geth Armatures and other Geth patrolling the area to look toward it in confusion. Then a 400-some ton black and red mass flew out of the Relay and smashed through their ranks, finally hitting a wall, utterly destroying the Armature it had nailed to the wall with its left tread guard. The other Armature and the rest of the Geth had long since become pulverized parts under the tank's mighty tracks (or track guard armour).

Inside the Tank, Shepard was urgently checking Liara's vitals, it wasn't looking good. Even though her suit had fed her significant amounts of sugar, oxygen, and electrolytes to replace what she had lost, in addition to enough cooling so her body did not vaporize itself, the Asari was in bad shape. Her vitals were still somewhat erratic, and signs of fatigue were rather obvious, she would probably have to sit out the final battle with Saren. Shepard was looking around to see if there was anything in the Rhino he could use to make her comfortable when a hand, still encased in green and white armour, came up and grabbed his helmet, turning it around to face the now-awake Asari.

"Shepard, I may be biotically drained for the time being but I'm not dead yet." Liara said softly, starting to push herself up with her left arm, the one not holding Shepard's helmet. She was, however, noticeably pale and slightly shaky, but the suit's medi-gel injectors could also transport nutrients or electrolyte solutions, so her problem was rapidly resolving itself. "I can still fight, John, and remember I'm not looking for a protector." She finally stood back up and put her helmet back on.

"That should be impossible, unless… oh, for one who has yet to lose any of her power to mating excessively, and for one so young… yes, it is plausible, especially considering her armour's abilities." Vigil muttered to itself.

"Vigil, we're getting you a synthetic body as soon as possible, because that nagging routine is getting really annoying." Shepard growled, causing everyone to laugh before they exited the Rhino, Liara staggering slightly from the sheer exhaustion her exertion had caused.

"For a supposed suicide mission Ilos was absurdly easy, though I have a feeling the next part will be somewhat harder…" Liara mumbled.

Shepard turned and raised an eyebrow, still holding his LBR at waist level "Don't you mean less boring?"

Liara agreed "That too."

* * *

A/N: I suddenly feel terrible for making the Ilos thing such a cakewalk, but the first half of the level, opening the door, did start with a need for heavy weapons, and the Particle Cannons on the Rhino are enough to blast small glass craters in the ground along with leave scorch marks many meters across… And as we know when rushed for time, the Rhino would simply run everything other than Colossi over, its treads are a good five meters tall for a reason, you know.

Biotics = Mass Effect, Relays = Mass Effect, who's to say a sufficiently powerful biotic could not feed power to a relay if only for a moment? This will become important in SupCom: ME 2… prepare to be amazed, Samara!

IF the Star Wars galaxy gets connected to this one, obviously the CIS leaders will get replaced, please go read the Halo Star Wars crossover Sins of a Galactic Empire by SpaceCowboy2013. It will be similar to that in that the CIS will have real evidence of the corruption of the Republic, but the Coalition is a hell of a lot more advanced than the UNSC is in that fic is.

Oh, about the Star Wars crossover thing, I noticed that given the fact that Turbolasers can be used for close ground support (as in knocking down skyscrapers), their yield is likely something like low kilotons, and damage rate (of a single turbolaser, since most ships have a number of them) shouldn't be much higher than a Ravager or two… by the time actual contact occurs, of course, and after the Covenant War and Reaper War. Also note that we're not talking about Galactic Alliance (After New Republic) era Turbolasers, we're talking Clone Wars (even more comical due to infantry squares and incredibly weak armour for the Clones) and early Empire.

And about the Forerunner plasma tech and overall tech level… their dreadnoughts rely on basically brute power to shields and stuff, I'd say. The Sentinel construction platforms are ridiculously slow and the bots are so freaking weak it's not even funny. If the Forerunners were more advanced than SupCom, then you'd think their platforms could spew out sentinels at insane rates with nanolathing, but NOOOO… Also, Covenant Plasma tech needs to be nerfed to reasonable proportions, for example, ship-grade plasma cannon on a SCARAB? Wouldn't that accidentally vaporize the city when it gets fired? And vaporize the Scarab too? Hence I am thinking a Covenant Plasma Turret on a ship could be like a beefed-up Sonance, slightly faster reload, much higher yield, but much less focused, hence still effective for glassing. This is because 90 kilotons per hit focused yield like the Sonance would need like 500 KT unfocused to be equivalent in directional power, I think, that's a strategic-level yield by today's standards, and is 25x the Hiroshima nuke yield. Use a faster cycling time on the guns and voila you get the same effect as in Halo canon, though a small fleet will be needed to glass a planet in three days or so.


	30. The Endgame

A/N: Thank you for the suggestion of getting in the lakes of the Presidium. I doubt the water is deeper than about thirty meters… hence all SupCom units are able to cross. Amphibious units can deal with deeper waters, all the way down to abyssal depths if need be.

For the record I meant IF I bring in Star Wars then it would need to be after the Covenant War and Reaper War. And no I never played Homeworld. The abnormal age/mating vs. power thing for Liara will not be explained until SupCom: ME 2, you'll just have to wait.

* * *

Chapter 30: The Endgame

_Citadel, July 22, 3868_

"Dragon's Teeth, I hate the damned things…" Shepard growled opening fire along with the team on the five husks that dared try to rush them, mowing them down in seconds. "Let's go find that damned VI and figure out what the hell's going on." He stalked over to a console "Avina, situation report"

The holographic Asari materialized before them "Commander Shepard, evacuation of the Presidium is a critical priority," she went on to blab about the damage to the Presidium ring of the Citadel.

Shepard cut her off "Where's Saren and where's he headed?"

"Saren Arterius is approaching the Council Chambers. C-Sec is currently unable to respond to the threat. Please note that there are a lot of Geth on the station and the Citadel tower at present."

"Where's the Council then?"

"The Council has been evacuated to the Destiny Ascension as per emergency procedures."

"Where are Captain Anderson, Elite Commander Dostya and Ambassador Udina?"

"Elite Commander Dostya left the Citadel approximately six hours before the Geth attacked, the others, I am afraid I cannot provide specific locations."

"Thanks, Avina, come on guys, to the elevator!" Shepard dramatically jumped into the elevator once his team was all inside.

* * *

Saren tapped the button that would signal the beginning of the end for those who dared oppose the Reapers in the Council Chambers. Outside, the arms of the Citadel began to close.

* * *

"All remaining forces, keep Sovereign out of the arms! Focus fire on Sovereign!" Executor Pallin shouted into the comm. on the dreadnought that was the flagship of the Turian fleet stationed at the Citadel, they'd been caught completely by surprise and there had been way too many Geth cruisers… That cursed flagship, Sovereign had destroyed dozens of cruisers, Asari, Turian and Salarian, already and was still killing more.

A wing of Turian cruisers opened massed fire on Sovereign to no effect, the gigantic squid-like ship simply forcing its way through the line, dispatching a cruiser with a single shot from an arm, and blasting several more before it disappeared into the maw of the closing Citadel, wrapping two of its arms around the Citadel Tower and docking with the structure.

* * *

The elevator stopped without warning, and Shepard rolled his eyes "Make sure your suits are completely sealed, we're heading out."

After receiving a series of confirmations as well as the squad status indicators flashing readiness, Shepard fired at the elevator side with his GLMG, shattering it with one shot. "Engage packs, guys, we're heading out for a fly."

The squad took off up the tower, opting to "moonwalk" with their Quantum Propulsion Packs until they got the hang of it. They watched as an elevator car, stuck to their left, hit another that was moving up the tower, shattering both and spilling the hapless occupants into space, except, they weren't so hapless. Geth Troopers, Rocket Troopers and Shock Troopers spilled into the void, firing at the team, who fired straight back, having the definite advantage in mobility, firepower and protection. The Geth went down in showers of sparks dissipating in the hard vacuum, clouds of hydraulic fluids, and of course metallic pieces.

"well, guys, let's get onto the next walk area, use your packs!" The team jumped toward the next walkway up the exhaust plain. They were met with resistance by a horde Geth and several Krogan, with the result that the team flew circles around their enemies' cover and blasted them with their heavy weapons, namely ULPAs, Temporal Fizz Launcher, and Gauss Chaingun.

The three Geth Destroyers were riddled with holes courtesy of Wrex, and Tali found to her delight that the flamethrower still worked in vacuum when she decided to blast fire down upon a group of Troopers. Liara was restricted to dual-wielding SMGs, but it wasn't much of a problem due to the relative lack of recoil in the weapons (what little recoil there was got absorbed by the armour's recoil dampeners) and their high firing rate and good firepower. Garrus was copping easy kills with his LBR and generally having a good time, while Shepard dealt with targets with his Temporal Fizz Launcher, very effective in vacuum due to the blasts it made.

The group rounded another corner of some sort of protrusion on the Tower before the team first made a joke about the thing "You know, for a phallic object, this thing sure has a lot of bumps and ridges, are you sure Sovereign's not trying to get off using the Tower?" That was Wrex.

"I think you're right, Wrex, it looks like Sovereign's trying to impale itself on the tower!" Garrus said, blasting another couple of Geth Troopers that made an appearance casually with his LBR as he theatrically threw his left arm up over his head. "Sadly it's just too big a tool for the poor thing…"

"I'm recording this, you know, it would do later generations good to see the true story behind the heroes who stopped Saren." Shepard said good-humouredly, shaking his head at his crew's theatrics. "Come on, guys, let's use our packs to get further up the Tower or at least until we encounter more enemies." The group lifted off and flew further up the tower, touching down as Tali's Omni Sensor detected more threats close by (they'd already bypassed several more distant groups).

Three Rocket Troopers, two Shock Troopers and a Sniper later (involving plenty of stomping, burning, shooting, and bludgeoning), the group found themselves stuck beneath a Dropship as it rained down Geth. To be exact, it would drop Shock Troopers, Juggernauts, Destroyers and hordes of troopers at once, meaning Temporal Fizz Launcher and Gauss Chaingun work was absolutely mandatory, with Garrus copping the bigger Geth every time one appeared and Tali and Liara gunning down anything the others missed. After two waves Tali managed to get a Citadel Defence Turret behind them online and put enough shield disruptor bolts into the Dropship to, with the Turret's help, "encourage" it to leave, but not before it dropped an Armature.

"Up and over!" Shepard called, the squad flew up and over the armature, out of the firing arcs of its machine guns and forcing it to tilt its head back "Grenades!" with that call, five Electron Grenades were thrown at and stuck onto the Armature, which vanished several moments later in five explosions, each with a large EMP frying any systems the explosions did not destroy.

The group headed up the next path up the tower without further incident, at least for a while, though they were charged by a small horde of Geth Destroyers, at least ten, though Shepard kept them under control with Temporal Fizz Launcher work, slowing the suckers down with the Chronotron fields of the weapons. This was enough for Wrex, Liara and Garrus to whittle down their numbers enough to be smelted into charred hulks by Tali, her Sabotage had prevented the Destroyers from opening fire from longer ranges and forced them to charge.

It took quite a while and a couple of hand-to-hand scraps (Garrus got into a fistfight with one Destroyer until he headbutted it with his bulky, boxy UEF helmet and gained the upper hand), but eventually the crew cleared out the Geth and proceeded onward around yet another corner.

"Turrets! Up and over boys!" Shepard yelled, it was much easier to dodge the slow rockets when in the air, though it made things slightly harder for killing the smaller Geth. Once the smaller Geth were down, the turret actuators simply weren't enough to prevent the team from latching onto the back and shoving electron grenades into the turret pivots, the major structural weak point of the rocket turrets. This of course resulted in several headless turrets standing before the entrance to the Council Chambers, which Shepard's team entered rather quickly through an airlock.

The crew ran up the stairs into the courtyard, where the cherry tree-like trees (pink flowers…) were burning merrily and alarms were blaring, though the air was also conspicuously clear of arrogance. They came, they saw and they utterly steamrolled Saren's last line of defence, Shock Troopers, Rocket Troopers and Troopers. When the final Geth parts clattered to the ground, having been blasted apart by a certain Quarian machinist's Phasic Shotgun, the squad marched up toward the Master Control Terminal. Saren suddenly appeared overhead on his flying platform and threw a grenade down at the squad, who ducked behind cover even though their over-shields could take 70mm Gauss shells just fine, better safe than sorry.

"Ah, Shepard, it is good to see you, I was worried you wouldn't get here in time to see the dawning of a glorious new age, one of organics and synthetics working together." Saren's eyes almost glowed while he talked.

"Well I didn't get here to see it, Saren, sorry but your little mad plan is over, you're finished, Saren… by the way, why are your eyes glowing like that?"

"Sovereign sensed my hesitation after what you said on Virmire, he has… upgraded me."

"You let THAT squid thingy that's humping the Citadel right now trying to get off implant you?" Shepard gaped comically with his helmet optics.

"The Reapers need organics, Shepard, join us, they cannot be stopped, any who oppose then will die, but perhaps if we join them, we may survive."

"Saren, I don't know what's gotten into you, but according to what everyone else said you used to be a cynical but fun guy to have around, not this psychopathic stereotyped bad guy. If you have a family, they want you back, Nihlus wants his old friend back, and so does everyone else who knew you, fight the implants, Saren, there is a way to win against the Reapers for now, and if we keep on winning, eventually, the Reapers will have been defeated, fight the compulsions, Saren, fight for yourself and for every sentient in the galaxy."

Saren's gun clattered to the ground as he clawed at his head "I… can't… too late, too strong."

"I can get rid of the implants, Saren, just… stand still for a moment." Shepard took his CAR from the slot it had been in on his armour and levelled it at Saren, who was twitching as if wanting to jump away from the bulky weapon. Shepard fired, the massive round splashing itself against Saren's chest, the Nanites diffusing into the flesh in seconds and setting about repairing the damage indoctrination had done, though it knocked Saren out with a general anaesthetic and disabled the implants and kill switches via EMP and overwhelming electronic attack.

"Let's hope the new assimilation coding and stuff for Turian works…" Shepard said, looking down at the Cybran Assimilator Rifle in his hands before putting it away and walking over to the Master Control Terminal.

"I hope that works too… hmm… the Citadel's systems are still the same, I see…" Vigil spoke up again "Alright, you have control, what you want to do?"

"Open the arms, Shepard, quickly!" Liara advised.

"Establish a comm. channel, we'll need it!" Tali suggested.

Shepard did both, the first thing that came over communications was "Barriers at 40, primary drives offline, this is the Destiny Ascension, the Council is onboard, requesting immediate support, repeat, requesting immediate support!" He raised an eyebrow and wished them good luck.

"This is Jeff Moreau of the Normandy, I hope I'm getting you, Commander."

"We hear you, Joker, what's the situation?"

"I'm sitting here in the Sol System with the entire third and fourth Hunter Squadrons ready to jump in at your location. Got the quantum core replaced by one of the gantries already, we can jump in and save the Ascension if you open up the Relay to the Citadel… damned interference from the Nebula, should have known we should have put a Gate there to act as a beacon… good thing Coalition ships can function as beacons."

"Let the Council die, what good have they done your kind or mine, or even the Quarians?" Wrex rumbled, before breaking out into very, very scratchy and screechy song "What are they good for… absolutely nothing." That was before Tali clubbed him over the helmet with her shotgun.

"Wrex, that was the most horrific noise I've heard in years, please, don't try it again." Tali told the Krogan, who was rubbing his helmet, thankful that they did not live in an anime world or she would have used the traditional HAMMER technique on him.

"The situation is much larger than humanity, Shepard." Liara put in "Sovereign is a threat to the entire galaxy…" She trailed off, knowing John would get the point.

"Yeah, well saving the Ascension would waste valuable reinforcements, thought of that?" Wrex countered.

"I'm opening the Relay now, save the Ascension!" Shepard called out over the comms "Good luck, Joker, Seth, and Mom!" _If I didn't do that, the Coalition would be on the smear campaign to end all smear campaigns… and also Liara would get mad at me. Besides, we need the Council Races to have leadership to mobilize for the Reaper War…_ Shepard did a mental eye-roll at his thoughts. _Yes, indeed, the Coalition is too lazy to do it all on its own, even though we could probably pull it off._

* * *

The Normandy exited the Mass Relay with cloak and stealth fully engaged, unnoticed by the other ships duking it out outside the closed cylinder that was the Citadel. The X-shaped Destiny Ascension was doling out enormous amounts of damage to more distant Geth battle clusters with its secondary guns, but its close-combat weapons simply weren't enough to hold off the angry swarm of Geth cruisers that flowed around it like a horde of Air Superiority Fighters swarming a CZAR or Soul Ripper.

The 3rd and 4th Hunter Squadrons quantum-jumped in moments after the Normandy exited the Relay, their engines flaring as they dove down upon the Geth fleet.

The Orizaba, flagship of the 3rd Hunter Squadron, was first to open fire with its Heavy Microwave Laser, slicing through a Geth cruiser in under three seconds, and then the rest of the Coalition ships opened up with their longer-ranged weapons. A hail of plasma accelerator, laser, plasma beam, Sonance and Heavy Oblivion Cannon fire picked off the Geth Cruisers that were pestering the Ascension one by one in short order, and soon the Ascension was in the clear. A small swarm of Geminis and Restorers protected it from Geth Cruisers while the Hunter Squadrons moved on toward the slowly opening Citadel itself.

A Ship Gantry, probably the heaviest-armed and heaviest-shielded (and largest, when expanded to the dimensions it used for installation construction) ship the Coalition had, though immensely slow, jumped in and approached the Ascension. Its construction arms expanded as more mass was pushed into them from the Osmium Mass Storages of the vessel.

"What are you doing?" Matriarch Lidanya was rarely surprised, but this… thing that was expanding from a 1-kilometre wide ship-like thing to a 2.5-kilometre wide scaffold was a shock. The Ascension's four arms each house a 1-km Mass Accelerator, the central hull projects forward with a 1.2 km Mass Accelerator with four auxiliary 1-km Accelerators as well, (symmetrical therefore balanced, the ship will not spin whenever it fires like the Halo MAC guns would) but this thing dwarfed them now.

"Fixing your ship, that's what. I'm Hannah Shepard, commander of the 3rd Hunter Squadron, we're here to assist, the Ship Gantry that's currently approaching your ship will scan you for damage and repair damaged parts with our emergency hull repair materials, it won't be up to our specs but it'll take a hell of a lot of punishment." A human with facial circuitry said in response to her question, a Cybran, then, Lidanya remembered from her leave a year ago on an Aeon-held planet that was essentially paradise. (Yes, the map called Paradise is in fact a real place, though the area is more like 100x100 km)

"I hope it stands up to that weapon Sovereign uses…" Lidanya said "Thanks for the assist, Shepard, wait, are you related to…"

"Yep, my son's down there on the Citadel right now, and that's just one of the reasons I really need to go kick Sovereign's ass… oh, the Citadel's opening, gotta go!" Shepard closed the channel as the ominous arms of the Ship Gantry moved over the Ascension and locked the ship in place (eight docking clamps, two on each arm). Then the Gantry's arms lit up with Aeon-style construction pods, of the type employed on SCUs with the Rapid Fabricator upgrade, focusing on the holes and craters in the Ascension's hull.

Matriarch Lidanya watched in slack-jawed surprise as the status boards went from red to orange to yellow to green one by one before her eyes, it must have taken tens of thousands of tons of material to perform so many repairs so quickly… where did it all come from?

The standard comm. channels lit up again with a transmission broadcast from the other Coalition Battlecruiser, it was a reptilian humanoid that gave the command this time "All attacking ships, focus fire on Sovereign, repeat, focus fire on Sovereign!" Lidanya wished them better luck than the Ascension had had… when her ship had faced off against Sovereign; the much large ship had thrown enough fire at the Ascension to drop the shields in under half a minute. Were it not for the swarming action of a fleet of brave, and now dead cruisers, Sovereign would have finished the Ascension off before it could get away, its main gun array in ruins, its engine pods damaged, and two of its arm guns down. The shields had rebooted just in time to allow the Ascension to (barely) hold out against the swarm of Geth Cruisers that attacked it…

* * *

"Well, let's get Saren somewhere safe… good, his implants have all been re-assimilated… excellent, though he'll be Cybran for the rest of his life, at least he has a life." Shepard told the team.

"Shouldn't we punish him for his actions?" Garrus asked.

"Garrus, mind control and such leave victims no choice, in the history of the Coalition no one has ever been punished for actions under the influence of mind control." Shepard told the Turian, "Let's get moving…"

As they picked Saren's body, now with circuitry expanding over his skin, up, the Citadel Tower shook slightly. "You know… I really hope Saren's not about to do a reincarnation with his implants, controlled by Sovereign, right now, that would be annoying and stereotypically RPG-like." Garrus commented

"Well, I don't think he'll be doing anything… scanners show full Cybran implants now, nothing left of the Reaper tech." Tali said, looking down at her readouts.

"That's a relief, at least." Shepard pulled Saren into the Rhino, followed by the rest of the crew, and strapped him into a seat before starting the tank moving.

* * *

Sovereign had finally let go of the Citadel Tower and opened up with all six arms at the Orizaba. The Battlecruiser managed to dodge two but the rest struck home solidly against the shields. "Fuck, another full volley and we're done ma'am!" The pilot of the 800-meter ship yelled.

"Dodge then." Hannah replied calmly as the Reaper decided to Cull Weakest instead, since the Destroyers, Heavy Cruisers and Light Cruisers were doing a lot of damage to its shields and were easier prey. "Make sure all our guns can fire on the squid, it isn't getting away from me. Also, everyone into the escape pods, we might have to do this after all…" The "escape pods" as they were called were glorified Janus-class fighter/bombers anchored to the hull, the bomb bays had been removed for an extra power core and shield generator space, and they were also conveniently stealthed.

The Orizaba pulled a turn like an Air-Superiority Fighter as it brought maximum weapons to bear, positioning Sovereign directly ahead of the ship's prow, allowing all fixed weapons as well as most of the rotating weapons to be brought to bear, blazing away at the thing's shields. "What's the estimated shield strength on that fucker?" Hannah bellowed, watching her ship's shields disintegrate and scorch marks appear over the hull from another three hits, though the structural fields held it off.

"At least 5 million points, ma'am!" the sensor officer yelled over the comm. as they strapped themselves into the escape pod, still controlling the ship with their strategic interfaces on their armour.

"Fuck, that's going to take a while… I really wish we had a Yolona Oss around… and I really wish I'd gone with the suggestion of gluing more Athanahs to the surface of the ship!" She muttered as another pair of shots struck home and the Orizaba's structural fields flickered off. The next shot punched into the hull of the ship and left behind a crater where the barrel of the Sonance Artillery used to be, and the next blew away the Heavy Microwave Laser "Alright, time to abandon ship and head to the nearest Heavy Cruiser…" She muttered, hitting the launch button for the escape craft, the upgraded fighter/bomber detaching from and accelerating away from the doomed Battle Cruiser, which was still firing away defiantly with its multitude of weapons. She headed out of the Citadel's arms, where the 24 frigates and 40 corvettes of the 4th Hunter Squadron were clearing away the Geth Cruisers, and to the Ship Gantry, the largest and safest place in the system (the Citadel was larger, but hardly safe at the moment).

"What's that?" One crew member exclaimed, pointing at the lone Battle Cruiser-sized capital ship that was registered as a Coalition ship, but was still hanging outside the Citadel, duelling it out with the largest remaining Geth Cruiser with lasers, missiles, and point defences.

Hannah raised one of her eyebrows at the visual scan of the hammerhead ship "Seth, did you REALLY bring Raynor's boys over here?"

"Well, they were on their tour of the Coalition after their ship's basic overhaul… so when I received the message about the Citadel situation, I asked if they wanted to come along on a trip, they agreed." Seth did his best innocent grin, while Hannah simply leered at his holographic image in irritation. "By the way, that ship… I think I've seen something like it before… in some old legends or something… something to do with why we went to the Quantum Realm… ah well."

"Hmm, old legends you say? We can talk about that later… I hope the Raiders have shields on their ship… hmm, that's a pretty nice weapon." The Hyperion had just fired its Yamato Gun again, after a cool-down of ten seconds from the last firing, and the flickering shields of the Geth Heavy Cruiser finally gave way, the ship lighting up with secondary explosions and ripping itself to scrap. The Gun had now been upgraded to cycle much faster, though the Raiders declined the offer of replacing it with a Sonance Artillery piece, which took up less room and did similar damage per time as the upgraded Gun. The Hyperion then proceeded toward the Citadel. "SETH! Tell Raynor it's not safe for his ship, the Orizaba was destroyed in a few volleys god damn it!"

"Hannah Shepard, is it?" a grizzled black-haired man came on the holographic comm. just as the escape pod docked with the Ship Gantry "Well, you see, my boys are probably the heaviest infantry available in-system, especially after the upgrades we got from you guys, so I figured we could land them on the ground and wipe out those Geth that Seth said were infesting this station… though I hear they don't need much help from how your formerly secret Coalition Armouries were handing out Coalition Civilian Armour and weapons…"

* * *

_Half an hour before present time… Zakera Ward, Citadel._

"Everybody listen up!" Lieutenant Ernest Zabaleta yelled above the din of the milling crowd in the open square beneath his platform, the roof of the Zakera Ward Coalition Armoury. When that didn't work, he fired off a burst form his GLMG into the ceiling, causing the crowd to go silent in fear. "Those Geth fuckers attacked us, but we have armour and we have weapons, this building is the Zakera Ward Coalition Armoury," The two supposed statues of Mech Marines came to life and stood ready, several floors below Zabaleta's position. "We will issue weapons and armour to anyone who isn't willing to sit here and wait for the Geth to come and kill them. Now, those of you who are not willing to fight, take one step back." Nobody moved, the countless Asari, Turians, Salarians, Krogan, Humans, Quarians and others of Zakera Ward all hanging onto every word of the Lieutenant. "All those willing to fight, take one step forward" The entire crowd collectively stepped forward. It was, after all, the last square at the end of Zakera Ward, so they had nowhere really to run.

Zabaleta looked around for a moment "Good, line up by race and we will distribute slightly modified armour for your specific race, after all, you would not expect a Krogan to fit into armour modified for Quarians, would you?"

The crowd chorused "No, sir!"

"Good, now, Krogan by that wall, Turians next, then Salarians, then Quarians, and finally Asari by this wall, if you are none of those, please stand at the back of the square, we will get to you in time." The crowd began to sort themselves out, a few Elcor, Hanar and Volus standing at the back while the rest assembled reasonably neatly "we have a hundred Coalition Marines here, and about ten thousand of you, so about a hundred of you to each Marine, they will designate section leaders. Remember, we fight for our homes and for our lives! We will drive the Geth from this station, and above all, we will survive!" The Marines had gone down the lines, distributing armour packages, which unpacked and unfolded to provide the necessary coverage. It was easiest to distribute the armour to the Asari and the dozen or so Quarians, as effectively zero modifications were needed (other than the fingers for Quarians). The Turians and Salarians required minor modifications, while the Krogan needed taller back armour and a more streamlined helmet, making them the last to leave, each person was equipped with a laser SMG and Gauss Pistol ("In case you need to crack a window").

Zabaleta didn't bother worrying about theft, since they all had beacons that would broadcast their position if a certain signal was put out. Also, any attempts to scan or hack the armour/weapons would result in non-functionality, and the weapons would self-destruct (explosively) if not returned after the battle was over…

It was thus that the Zakera Ward militia was formed, under the command of Lieutenant Ernest Zabaleta and the 100 Coalition personnel that manned the Armoury. Though they were not all Marines, even the chefs had been trained to handle Light Armour and all typed of weapons, so compared to the Civilians not even trained to use Coalition Civilian Armour, they were Marines.

* * *

_Present Time…_

Shepard's crew had kept the hordes of Geth out of the Presidium with great success, in no small part due to driving the Rhino around gunning/running down the Geth. Unfortunately for the Council's upkeep fees, the lakes of the Presidium were now without fail all completely contaminated, though they did surprise and run over a large concentration of Geth Rocket Troopers by hiding and ambushing them using the largest lake. Shepard laughed his ass off when they managed to drown an Armature by shoving it in the lake, it seemed that Particle Cannon barrels, over a dozen meters long, were very effective at clubbing/shoving things that got too annoyingly close when the turret was spun at high speed. Another experiment (Tali's idea) involved chasing Geth up the curved side walls of the Presidium, skewering them on the barrels of the cannons (only worked with Primes and Juggernauts), and dropping them into the lake by firing the guns, the recoil driving the barrels back hard enough for the Geth to be left falling into the water.

While Shepard and co. were amusing themselves, the battle overhead was beginning to come to a climax. Two Coalition Heavy Cruisers, three Light Cruisers and three Destroyers had been destroyed after the Orizaba's final weapons had been silenced by the power cores being vaporized, but Sovereign was beginning to waver. Its first layer of shields flickered and died as a Coalition Destroyer was eviscerated by a concentrated blast from all six arms. The ship's backup shields kicked in barely in time to intercept the first Yamato Gun blast as the Hyperion entered the fray, lighting the target up with Yamato fire and its heavy laser cannon batteries.

A wing of Shocker Strategic Bombers that had been built on the Ship Gantry during the battle streamed in between two of the arms of the Citadel and performed a fly-by bombing run on Sovereign, their Quark Bombs flying into the shields as they peeled up and flew out of the next gap up, one arm over their entry gap. The shields shuddered from the continuous damage the Lasers and other weapons threw against it as Sovereign thrashed and opened up with its main mass accelerator on a Coalition Heavy Cruiser. The target vanished from a single volley of of shots down the three 2.5 km long mass accelerators that made up Sovereign's main weapons.

The Hyperion, operating on a skeleton crew, due to most of the crew having suited up in Raider armour and joined the battle on the Citadel against the Geth, was the next target for the Reaper's weapons. Three blasts from the arms of the squid-like ship punched through the shields and hull of the aging Battlecruiser and left it a burned-out hulk. The crew had already boarded their escape pods (read: glorified fighters) and had been controlling the ship via strategic interface, so there were no casualties since Raynor hit the ejection controls soon enough.

One of the best things about Coalition ships was that it was customary for the crews (which were very small) to control the ships from inside shuttles or escape pods via strategic interface (armour hologram projectors) whenever there was a risky battle, so casualties among ship crews tended to be rather low. This was, of course, assuming low fighter presence/AA in the area of the battle. "Seems like we're gonna ask the Coalition for a new ship then…" Raynor commented dryly. "Or ask them to restore the Hyperion… yeah; I'll need to ask them… Hey Seth, you mind restoring the Hyperion for me and my boys after this battle?"

"No problem, friend Raynor, we'll add some improvements, if you don't mind…"

"Nah, add all the upgrades you want, I have a feeling the Raiders will need it before too long." Raynor said off-handedly, scooting outside the arms of the Citadel and to the Ship Gantry waiting outside, which had just released the now fully repaired Destiny Ascension. The Janus docked without further incident, and the Hyperion's command crew disembarked, joining up with the others now awaiting the outcome of the battle. The Ship Gantry was lumbering toward the open mouth of the Citadel at a hideously slow pace, its eight Heavy Microwave Lasers, one per arm, though in turrets unlike Sovereign's arms, opening up one by one. Ship Gantries were effectively very powerful but hideously slow and unwieldy ships, though they did not have the weakness to small, close-in swarms that most such ships had, being studded with Zealot SIM Launchers, Electron Flak batteries and Ravager Point Defences for close combat. However, it was only combat-capable (as in the Heavy Microwave Lasers were online) when fully extended, but could not perform FTL jumps when in this state, this was the one major flaw n using it for combat, but in times of need…

Sovereign's spinal Mass Accelerators dropped the extremely powerful shields of the Gantry (around 1,500,000 points' worth) to 80% in two volleys, but the Gantry was doing some real damage to the now-trapped Reaper, finally cutting through its shields and shearing pieces of hull away. The clash of titans resulted in the eight Heavy Microwave Lasers of the Ship Gantry prevailing, though everyone on the Coalition side was wishing at the same time that they had nukes. A standard Strategic Nuke would have dealt around 1 million points to Sovereign in a single hit at point-blank detonation (note that the area detonations on the ground sacrifice damage density for blast radius, hence only 70,000 points) and Yolona Oss would have been even better.

Sovereign finally died after a few seconds of slicing action from the lasers, secondary explosions tearing it apart, Zealot, Loa, Ravager, Oblivion, Plasma and Proton fire tearing into the larger remains to reduce damage to the Citadel, while the ships that could still move moved toward the Gantry fore repairs and the Gantry sent out a small swarm of UEF "Rover" Construction Drones (same type as employed in "The Kennel" Engineering Stations) to reclaim wreckage for Mass to use to repair the damaged ships.

* * *

A large piece of Sovereign flew toward the large window of the Council Chambers, where Shepard's crew had gone to retrieve Vigil after being relieved of Presidium-holding duty by Raiders armed with Gauss Chainguns and Infantry Nanodart Launchers. "Oh shit… RUN!" Shepard yelled, as he, Tali and Garrus scrambled to get out of the way. Wrex and Liara were still downstairs.

The wreckage shattered the window and fell toward the team, who dove for cover, hoping that the cover in question was strong enough to hold up the stuff. Garrus deployed his Hunker Pod just before everything went dark.

* * *

Anderson frowned as he and his medical team of Raiders and Coalition Marines (both for heavy lifting) and medical personnel sifted through the wreckage of the Presidium, hopefully Shepard's crew's armour was enough to prevent them from being crushed… Once three Raiders and two Marines had cooperated to use their suit hydraulics to lift up a rather large piece of debris, the Heavy UEF armour under the Wreckage disengaged its Hunker ability and crawled out.

"Garrus Vakarian reporting, Tali should be over there somewhere…" He gestured to another, somewhat smaller, chunk of debris. Once they jogged over, the search and rescue crew found a three-fingered hand in green and white armour sticking out from under the wreckage. They immediately lifted the entire piece off and allowed Tali to crawl out from where she'd been stuck under the piece of Reaper.

"Where's Shepard?" Liara had just gotten up to the Council Chambers after intimidating two Raiders to allow her into the area. The fact that they were put in stasis helped. Garrus and Tali pointed toward the largest chunk of debris, far larger than even the Rhino they'd spent so much time in.

Liara froze, her eyes widening "No…" She looked at the squad status indicators, where Shepard's vitals read "No Signal". "No… NO!" She screamed at the stars above them, her face twisted into a snarl that caused even Wrex to shrink away slightly. She flared bright blue, and threw her arms forward, teeth bared in an expression of fury that was frightening to watch.

The entire search and rescue team collectively blinked, gasped, stared and then gaped as the gigantic piece of Reaper accelerated out of the emergency atmospheric fields that had snapped into place over the breached window. It left behind only a suit of dented, scorched, and badly scratched Cybran Heavy Armour. As soon as Liara drove the piece of junk out of the Citadel gravity fields, she disengaged her biotics, trembling in exertion, her suit doing its best to keep her in fighting condition. She took one foot off the ground to walk toward Shepard, and her knees buckled, with the net result that she was crawling toward the fallen Cybran on hands and knees, breathing harshly and trembling from exhaustion.

The search and rescue team finally stopped staring at the piece of Reaper drifting away into space for long enough to notice Liara as she crawled toward their destination. Garrus and Tali immediately ran forward to help Liara up, supporting her as they moved toward the unmoving figure of their friend, or in Liara's case lover. Anderson and the medics ran toward Shepard with only a moment's hesitation, but Liara and co. still got there first.

"Shepard… Shepard!" Liara started, having gotten back on her feet thanks to the suit's input of extra glucose to fuel her metabolism. She looked over Shepard's armour worriedly, it didn't look good, the helmet was bent at an odd angle backward, toward the ground, due to a piece of wreckage that had become lodged under it, and the helmet neck seal was visibly cracked from the amount of stress put on the weak point.

"Hey, Liara, sorry, snapping your neck kinda hurts, even for a Cybran so, er… forgive me for the lack of words…" Shepard messaged her, the words appearing on her HUD "I'm really not used to using these secondary circuits to control my body functions…"

"Your neck…" Liara's breath caught in her throat, "Are you sure?"Her mind was panicking… She looked back at the squad status indicators, where Shepard's signal was still intermittent (armour damage?) but read "Broken Neck, Cybran, Stable" in the description box once she brought it up.

The medical squad locked John's armour in position and used a levitating stretcher to move him toward the exit of the Citadel Chambers, to take him to the hospital onboard all Ship Gantries "Yes, though I'll recover, courtesy of either my Cybran Nanites, Aeon Flash-cloning tech or some combination of the above." He still used messaging because he couldn't talk without risking further damage.

"That… that would be…" Liara's tears finally spilled over "That would be nice, Shepard." _Actually, that would be incredible, but the fact that the injury happened in the first place made it only "nice"._ She followed, stumbling along, behind the entourage entering the medical shuttle, a glorified Broadsword Gunship.

* * *

COALITION CODEX ENTRY: QUANTUM PROPULSION PACKS

Sentients have always dreamed of flying like birds, or at least of jumping tall obstacles in a single leap. With the newest fusion of Aeon anti-gravity and inertial manipulation tech, Seraphim quantum propulsion tech, UEF plating, shielding and alloys, and Cybran user control interface and smart autopilot navigation systems, the dream has come true. The new miniaturized system can fly at altitudes up to two hundred meters relative to the nearest large mass i.e. buildings and large obstacles, though this altitude limit is mostly a safety mechanism. If desperate, safeties can be removed (though disciplinary action may follow) and this can propel you as far as its energy ("fuel") reserves last. Flying upward against gravity or horizontally requires fuel, and although hovering and descending do not expend fuel, one can only regenerate "fuel" at a reasonable pace when on the ground. In the air, when out of fuel, movement rate is so slow in any direction other than down is generally considered too slow to be worth it.

The new system was inspired by various video games where flying infantry make an appearance, and is able to move at a speed of 288 km/h (again, a safety mechanism), automatically navigating around/over obstacles once the course has been input. All the user has to do is shoot at targets as they come up on the HUD, and decide when to land/input a new destination, note that a default command when moving to the location of a unit, friend or foe, is to follow that unit, one must use the move command directly to just move to where the other unit was.

This upgrade can be attached over the back of any Coalition Marine Armour under the back upgrade modules and will adjust itself to accommodate said upgrade modules. One of its less obvious benefits are the cushioning of all falls, it is now impossible to die of blunt trauma by falling, though it in no way affects incoming projectiles. Legend has it that one of the prototypes was fired from a Mavor barrel on an orbital starport attached to a space elevator at a passing asteroid and, when retrieved, the dummy inside did not report lethal trauma, nor was the suit the prototype was attached to severely damaged. Another of its less obvious benefits is the superiority it provides in zero-gee combat, when blasted free of the surface you were fighting on, the pack will automatically stabilize you and allow you to fly around shooting at enemies freely. Note that though it is not fitted to Civilian Armours, Civilian Armours everywhere are being upgraded with Impact Trauma Pods, which provide some defence against falling from, say, an aircraft at high speed.

The first time Quantum Propulsion Packs saw action was in the Battle of the Citadel. They were used by Commander John Shepard's special operations team in their battle up the exterior of the Presidium Tower. Thanks to their performance in live combat, the packs have become a standard part of all Coalition Marine Armours in the days since the Battle.

END OF CODEX ENTRY

FOR MORE INFORMATION, GO TO "AEON ANTI-GRAVITY TECHNOLOGY", "SERAPHIM QUANTUM PROPULSION TECHNOLOGY", OR MILITARY CODEX.

* * *

_Citadel, July 25, 3868_

Three days after he'd broken his neck and been forced to use his secondary circuits to keep himself alive, John Shepard was back at full health. _Wait, that sounded like an RPG, even in my head… then again there isn't much I can change it to… Who cares anyways, I might as well be part of an RPG anyways, I've saved the world, got the girl, all that good stuff, who cares if I sound like an RPG narration…_ John Shepard smiled to himself at his thoughts.

"What are you smiling about, Shepard?" Liara said, snuggling closer to her boyfriend on the comfortable self-cleaning seats the Coalition had repaired the Presidium with. The Coalition had cleaned up most of the damage to the Wards and Presidium within the last three days, when Engineering Drones had scoured the area for damage and replaced items wherever they could do so without releasing Coalition technologies.

"How I've saved the world and all that" He answered truthfully, after all, lying to your girlfriend was not a good idea, more so if said girlfriend is Asari.

Liara took her head off his shoulder for a moment and grinned at Shepard "I don't think I appreciate being described as 'all that', Shepard, how about we go back to the Normandy for a little down time?" Liara nuzzled Shepard, looking him in the eye from effectively zero distance.

"I would like that," he pecked her on the lips "but the meds they gave me to speed up neural regeneration causes, well, ED, since I'm not supposed to try to 'burn out the nerves before they're repaired', Chakwas's words, not mine." He finished. "By the way, the bones have been repaired so I can do kissing and getting my head squeezed just fine…" He waggled his eyebrows, remembering how Liara had clamped down on his head the night before Ilos.

"Hey, you lovebirds, get a room!" a certain Jeff Moreau said, using his crutches to get over to them, Vrolik's Syndrome was so rare as to not receive much public attention, and Joker, being the stubborn UEF that he was, refused to get implants, even though he was one of those unable to take cloned bones from healthy individuals.

Liara turned around "We were discussing that, Joker, but unfortunately Shepard's medications render him incapable for the time being… what?" She had turned back toward Shepard when she heard the slap of a facepalm. Joker sat down quickly before the laughter spilled over and made him clutch his belly. "Oh, I stuck my foot in it again, didn't I?" Nobody responded, since Wrex, Garrus and Tali were still slightly freaked out from the two stunts Liara had pulled off three days ago.

"Here comes the Council and Captain Anderson!" Wrex said, his wide field of vision, a common prey adaptation, coming in useful in the detection of pure arrogance.

"Great, three arrogant people, just what I needed during my recovery…" Shepard rolled his eyes.

"I agree, here's to hoping they don't see us." Liara began to kiss Shepard, trying to shield him from view. It was a good thing this area of the Presidium had been blocked from public access for now, or they'd have been fleeing screaming hordes of rabid fans, being "heroes of the galaxy" wasn't fun.

The Asari Councillor was first to spot Shepard and Liara and gestured toward them to her associates. They walked over to the couple, who rolled their eyes before breaking apart, though Liara was still on Shepard's lap, both of them glaring up at the Councillors. Shepard completely zoned out on the Asari's initial burst of thanks, it was meaningless politician talk anyways.

The Salarian began to talk, and Shepard actually bothered to listen for more than about a millisecond "So many soldiers gave their lives just so that we could be saved…" Shepard rolled his eyes, in reality, Coalition Capital ships were crewed by an average of ten people each, hence the small number of people that got away in escape pods was at best a non-issue, only about twenty people actually died in that battle on the Coalition side, since the Frigates and Corvettes that were destroyed were automated.

"We shall honour the sacrifices the Coalition made, Shepard; we share your grief over the loss of so many lives." Garrus's opinion of Velarn's voice was currently that Shepard was very much right to be constantly annoyed at this guy, it was indeed very irritating.

"We owe you a great debt that can never be repaid, Shepard." That was Tevos.

"You embody everything the Coalition stood for." That was the Salarian, Armin.

"We can't bring those who are gone back, but we can honour their sacrifice." _Thanks a lot Velarn, blah, blah, blah._

"We would like to invite the Coalition to join us as full members of the Council." Tevos started, that got Shepard's interest.

"We will need a list of candidates however…"

"With everything that's happened, your opinion will go a long way…"

"You will not attempt to force any of your conditions on us?" The three Councillors nodded collectively "Good, because the Coalition sure will not be getting rid of Cybrans anytime soon if you ask me." His small amount of facial circuitry pulsed once as he winked, revealing his Cybran identity "And we will not subject all our technology to inspection, understood?"

"That would be fine by us."

"Good, I think Captain Anderson would do best, he's had the most contact with the Council Races out of all the available officers, and in light of the Reaper threat he would probably get something actually done instead of blabbering like the average politician."

"I seem to recall Captain Anderson likes to let his fists do the talking, are you sure he is the right choice for the position Shepard?"

"For the record, Councillor Velarn, Elite Commander Dostya was the one who punished Udina for interfering with Coalition Military operations, she is my superior and thus short of killing or inflicting permanent harm on Udina I was to follow orders. A black eye does not constitute permanent harm, though Dostya's boot to Udina's crotch may do so, she has diplomatic immunity, and Udina was lucky not to have been shot for endangering the Galaxy."

"Alright, alright, spoken like a true Councillor, impeccable logic…" the Turian conceded defeat

"We welcome you, Councillor Anderson, that is, if you accept." Tevos told Anderson before turning back to Liara and Shepard. "I wish you happiness, Commander, goodbye, Shepard."

After the new four-person Council left, Liara blinked "So basically whatever choice you made they would have gone with it?"

"Probably, now where were we before? Let's go back to the Normandy; I'm getting tired of this station…"

Liara stood up from Shepard's lap and pulled her boyfriend along behind her "I am too, and I hope those meds wear off soon, Shepard."

Joker watched the two leave with a grin on his face, shaking his head before looking up toward the stars above them and the lights of the Wards, now almost fully repaired after the attack. That was in no small part due to Raiders and Coalition Marines clearing out the Geth and the Ship Gantry hanging around to clear out the wreckage with its engineering drones. The mass was reclaimed to supplement the Paragon, which they didn't even need to dial up to meet needs for the repairs. The first Reaper attack had been stopped, and the Galaxy was mobilizing to fight the Reapers, to break the cycle of extinction that had repeated itself for millions of years… _All was well with the world…_ Joker thought, sighing in contentment and grinning at how cheesy he sounded to himself.

A few seconds later, he tried to stand up and went down to the ground howling in pain, having broken his legs again. _Okay, maybe not ALL was well…_

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A/N: I hope you understand why the Hyperion has been modified so much compared to before, the new Hyperion in my SupCom: Koprulu Sector fic has Electron Flak, Zealot SIMs (Space Interception Missiles) and Loa Tactical Missile Bays. It's because it was destroyed and re-built, aesthetically, the new Hyperion looks the same as the one you see in the load screens and cinematics of Starcraft 2 but functionally and weapons-wise it will be a lot more powerful, a LOT more powerful.

If you want to tell me the Ship Gantry is OP, it took forever to move to the mouth of the Citadel when fully extended, whereas any other Coalition ship can pull fighter-like manoeuvres. Hence the reasons why it can be powerful without completely unbalancing things eve worse than they already are. Also, if you want to see OP, the original patch that gave the UEF T3 Sonar that torpedo launcher in the original SupCom (before another patch corrected it) accidentally created a very powerful motor torpedo boat that resulted in hordes of what were supposed to be buildings chasing Battleships around. Also the Gantry would have had no chance of beating Sovereign (considering Sovereign was using all weapons, including the three mass accelerators) without the fleet weakening it first, the true power of a Ship Gantry lies in its build rate (Churns out a BC in 12.5 hours) and the fact that it is mobile when folded/retracted, though the Lasers are offline when retracted.

In response to other points, the Flood WILL meet the Zerg (if I have anything to do with it), but in a much different way than you may have expected. As for why the Seraphim never mentioned the Reapers and stuff, you'll see in good time.

The indirect sequel (next in the string) is Supreme Commander: Koprulu Sector, which I will be working on for a while before I move on to the next ones in the string (or rather thread of the rope). Though they seem disconnected, in the end, they will all come together, go read it! Or, wait around until I finally get to SupCom ME 2, which may take a while and will reference certain events in the other fics in the string, so yeah.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011!

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Sneak Peek of Supreme Commander: Mass Effect 2

_Derelict Reaper, Mnemosyne System…_

"We'll bring up the rear, Morinth, Samara with me, Tali, James, get that Geth back to the ship!" Shepard shouted, firing another short burst from his GLMG (improved over the years since he'd died) downrange, sawing through another Husk with the high-velocity explosive rounds.

"Got it, Commander." The four with him answered ("Got it bro" from James), James and Tali beginning the task of hauling the disabled Geth back to the Restorer Gunship they'd dropped off in. it wasn't that much of task considering how much heavy lifting Coalition Marine Armour was capable of, but still hindered Jacob, who had the Geth slung over his shoulder.

Shepard chucked a singularity downrange "Best thing ever about my biotics… and the only ability I've got besides lift, oh well. Morinth, Samara, Shockwaves on my singularity!"

"Will do!" In relatively restricted spaces like the platforms they were conducting a fighting retreat across the clashing fields of two Shockwaves could produce a Warp-like interaction between them. Add the Singularity, and you had an explosive mix that would rend a horde of Husks to tatters, which, unsurprisingly, happened.

"Let's go home, boys, we got what we came for." Shepard, Morinth and Samara waited as the airlock cycled and the Restorer began to move with a subtle hum, just enough to tell the occupants the thing was in fact moving, before a silence overtook the ship as it flew toward the new Normandy.

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A/N: Now that I've teased everyone, thanks for reading and reviewing.

Suggestions for SupCom: The Thirteenth (nBSG comes in), WorldWar: Supreme Balance (Harry Turtledove's "Race" finds a much larger galaxy than they'd ever imagined), SupCom: The Reclaimers, and of course SupCom: ME 2 are very welcome. Note that SupCom: The Reclaimers (Halo comes in) is after ME2 in timeline. If you want to give suggestions on SupCom: Koprulu Sector, please go review on THAT fic.

REVIEW AND SUGGEST!

The Story String Continues in Supreme Commander: Koprulu Sector, which can be found on my profile. Thank you for reading.


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